Rhythm of my heartbeat

Every time I see you lookin' my way
Baby, baby, can't you hear my heartbeat?
In the car or walking down the highway
Baby, baby, can't you hear my heartbeat?
When you move up closer to me
I get a feelin' that's ooo-wee
Can't you hear the poundin' of my heartbeat
'cause you're the one I love, you're the one I love
When I feel you put your arms around me
Baby, baby, can't you hear my heartbeat?
Then I'm glad, I'm mighty glad I found you
Baby, baby, can't you hear my heartbeat?
(Herman's Hermits)

The sounds around the harigga were driving me crazy. They were thrumming in my head with such intensity I thought I couldn't stand it one more moment longer. I was reminded of a performance at the Carnival Caravan. Musicians, entertainers, hawkers and slaves had all taken position on a large platform stage. The bass note of drums beckoned listeners on the open plains to gather 'round. Musicians plunked strings and cymbals clashed and still the constant of the drum beat continued. We came to watch, Goldie and I, standing elbow to elbow with merchants and villagers alike. Whirling dervishes spun on each end of the stage, slaves in skimpy daring alluring livery. The announcer, finally satisfied with the size of the crowd, commanded silence for a moment while the introductions were made. And then it began again.

Thump, thump, thump. The drum started. A glissade of bells chimed the anticipatory beginning, and the voices took over. It was not a performance of song and tune, but a chorus of voices in chanting that carried the tale. Left stage, then right, then centered before us, the stories unfolded like news through a city given the wings of voice. The silences were monumental, ripe with a vast emptiness that allowed the mind to conjecture, anticipate, wonder and ponder, until one of the slaves would capture the attention. Through movement or display, the woman would center the focus and the voices would begin again. Highs and lows were marked with volume and pitch, with frantic portrayals by the slaves further defining the intended emotions. The intensity grew until capped to a simmer, stroked lovingly by the capabilities of the talented company, and then brought once more to the fevered pitch of excitement.. And still only the drums held the steady rhythm that kept everything cohesive and connected.

The drums...the same kind that now marked passages around the Harriga...kept news moving among the people. Voices, chanting with the same principles of sharing, telling a story of love, or sadness, kept the air alive. The Mistress Cana had fallen deeper into her illness, and the tales told of my Master helping. I was aware of His abilities now, though not first hand. I knew now that no Goldie kept residence in that seductive scent filled wagon, but He Himself. I knew when He had been there... not by the telltales signs of spent ash in copper pots, but by the air itself. Sometimes it was perfumed heavily with a smoky incense's reminder. Other times it was sparkling with electricity, or thick and heavy with a moist fog of confusion.
The voices had told the tales, and I had tasted the air myself. I believed. And I would not deny the whispered worries that the Ubara - and - my Master...might not make it back.
　
　
The touch was almost electric, and at the same time as soft as anything I had felt in my life. The dew sweet caress of a virginal blossom, stroking the path of the tender spot at inner thigh. The whisper of breath against the bud of a nipple leaving an almost painful tug to ripple through my inner recesses.
I had thought it the remnants of my activities, rapture envisioned through the exploration of fingers, a mirror likeness of wants and hungers played out over a landscape of tanned flesh and arousing memory's canvas. The floor boards beneath me had been kneaded into a lush bed of clouds. The torment became both a tapestry woven into my skin, and an internal succession of eruptions. A voice seeped through the pleasure to beckon with that cadence of voice I had followed with blind acceptance, and it spoke my name.
I struggled against the cloak of sleepy ecstasy to answer, but the timbre softened into the delicate tones of that womanly caress. It was feminine, this touch, stroking my senses with a coo of promise. It bid me to dwell in the thick syrup of intoxicating feelings, while telling me...He was gone. When fear stuck like icy shards in my veins, the voices - two - twins of note and expression, melted the sorrow with a hope.
"Come", they said. "He is not here. Come, we will show you how to find Him."
I could not feel Him, I could not smell Him, and I believed them. stumbling head long down the shadow wrapped steps into the night. A misty rain had driven everything into hiding, and the clouds had swept the light of moon and stars beneath a protective shroud. The voices sang a siren's profession, and my heart clenched in horror's grip while the cruel twist of arousal became a slander.
That beast below, that beast of horrible timing sprang out from no where. I felt the heavy weight of him against my thighs and then the damp ground beneath me as I fell. And when I opened my eyes...
they were all gone.
　
I spent days in search of Him, stopping everyone I happened upon. I knew it had been a dream, nothing more than a worry filled dream. But I couldn't shake it, no matter how hard I tried. I couldn't push aside the ache in my heart, nor the trepidation that seemed to cling to my shoulders. None had seen Him, nor had there been any word of Him. There was the starting muted talk that the Ubara was well, resting, sleeping, and comfortable. There was then another confidence shared, that indeed my Brave Warrior Master Fonce was too alive and well, and visibly no worse for the travel.
I breathed for the first time in days, but it was not enough. It was not... enough. I had to see Him, to touch Him, to breathe Him. I had to feel His heartbeat against mine so that I could live again. And so it was, when I finally spotted Him at the main fires, that I clung to Him as tightly as I ever have, and my joy knew no bounds.