"Don't forget. Sometimes I'm also a woman."
She rose and began to slowly draw out the long cinch holding the waist of her wrap. Her halter seemed to trouble her as she tried to loosen it. She laughed at her own awkwardness, and then it too came away. She was left with only her jewels and the long scarf over her hair, which she did not remove. Then she turned to him.
"Do you still remember our last night in Surat?"
"Do you?" He looked at her in the dim lamplight. The line of her body was flawless, with gently rounded breasts, perfect thighs, legs lithe yet strong.
"I remember what I felt when I kissed you."
He laughed and moved to take her in his arms. "But I thought I was the one who kissed you."
"Maybe we should try it once more and decide." With a mischievous look she caught his arms and wrapped herself around him. As he touched her lips, she turned abruptly and the world suddenly seemed to twist crazily around them, sending his head spinning. In shock he opened his mouth to speak and it was flooded with the essence of rose.
The pool beneath the platform had broken their fall. He came up gasping and found her lips.
She tasted of another world. Sweet, fragrant. He enclosed her slowly in his arms, clasping her lean body gently at first; then feeling more and more of her warmth he pressed her to him, both of them still gasping. They seemed to float, weightless, serene in the darkness. Awkwardly he began pulling away his wet jerkin.
"You're just as I imagined." Her hands traveled across his chest, lightly caressing his skin, while the lamp flickered against the paintings on the walls above them. "There's a strength about you, a roughness." She nuzzled his chest with her face. "Tonight will you let me be your poet?"