A Conversation With Phais

originally posted July 7, 2006

"Master is clever," Phais, first girl in a matched trio of preferred girls belonging to Clark of Thentis, of the House of Clark, told me.

"How so, slave girl?" I inquired.

"May Phais speak plainly?" she begged.

"Phais will be beaten should she speak in any other manner," I informed her.

I was feeling equitable that morning. I thought it fair to let her know where she stood.

"Oh!" she exclaimed.

"Get on with it," I told her.

Phais, as you can well imagine by her position on the chain of a fellow such as Clark, is frustratingly beautiful. The women she is paired with, Tellia and Elsa are not difficult to look upon either.

"Master clothes Elise in white and charges her to the service of his lofty companion," she said to me.

I thought she was hedging her bets by referring to Arjentia as 'lofty', but it was not an ill-advised approach on her part.

"Yes," I said.

"Elise, forgive Phais, Master," she begged, "is no Gretchen."

Gretchen, the girl she contrasted with Elise, serves as hand maiden to the companion of Clark, a woman I have yet to meet. I thought Phais' assertion was correct. Elise was no Gretchen.

"No," I concurred. "Elise is no Gretchen."

"It confused Phais at first and, too, Tellia and Elsa," she admitted, "why Master would wish a girl in white silk to learn the tile dance."

"I see no brook," I told her.

"The tile dance," she said, "is a 'need dance', Master."

"I am well aware of that, Phais," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. "What girl is more needy than a girl who knows the touch of men placed in white silk?"

"Indeed," I said.

"She, therefore, could not fail," Phais informed me.

"Master is clever."

"There is more to her aptness than simple denial and manipulation," I stated.

"Yes, Master," she said. "Elise has an abundance of female hormones. She is curvy and soft, emotional."

"That is known to me," I said.

"All women have the ability to dance," Phais offered. "Some women, women such as Elise, are Dancers."

"That, too, is known to me," I said.