Bombay

“Cardamon?” suggested Padma, the spice merchant, standing before her stall in Bombay’s Crawford Market. Thousands of little shops full of colourful Oriental goods filled the wide covered arcades of the Western-style building. “Cinnamon? Coriander? Pepper? Mustard? Fenugreek? Cloves? What can I help you with today?”

“I was looking for something a little bit more… spicy.”

“They’re all spicy. They’re spices.”

“I mean,” said Fiona Fairweather, casting her eyes over the copper trays laded high with mounds of coloured powder, the overflowing sacks, the cacophony of burnt red, bright green, golden-yellow hues. The smell of the little wooden stall, tucked in between a sari shop and a dessert stand, was almost overpowering, in a good way. “Something with a little kick to it.”

Padma looked blank. Fiona sighed.

“I mean,” she said, “I had a special recommendation from the Governess.”

“Ah, of course! You should have said. Lady Augusta is a very dear friend.”

“The Governess,” Fiona explained, as she was ushered by Padma into a back room behind a swaying bead curtain, “has tremendous respect for ancient Indian medicinal practices. I’ve just spent the night in her mansion up on Malabar Hill, and she’s got half a dozen consultants in saris hanging about the place to instruct her in yoga and astrology and tantric rituals and so forth.”

“Yes, a most open-minded woman. I admire her greatly. And, of course, she has done ever so much to bring the light of civilisation to us backwards savages.”

“Indeed! Why, you’ll almost be ready for democracy in another fifty years or so, thanks to the British Empire. Naturally, we’ve got to govern you for your own good until then, seeing as how we know so much more about everything than you do.”

“I quite agree. Now, you were after the special invigorating spice treatment?”

“The Governess recommended it specifically. She said it was just the thing I needed to speed me up a bit. You see, I’m on a race around the world!”

“How fascinating! You must tell me all about it while you take off your clothes.”

“My what?”

“The things you’re wearing. Have I got the word wrong?”

“A civilised woman,” said Fiona, witheringly, “does not take off her clothes in the middle of a public marketplace. It is most unseemly.”

“Yes, that’s why I have the curtain. How are you going to receive the special invigorating spice treatment with all your clothes on?”

“How do I receive it with them off?”

“Lie down on that mattress and I’ll show you,” Padma said, indicating the mattress. Fiona took a deep breath, shook her head as if amused, and let it out.

“The things we do abroad,” she said. “Alright. I’ll go along with your primitive folk-ways, just this once. After all, the Governess has undergone the same treatment.”

“Four times a week,” Padma said, removing the lid from a glass jar. She watched with professional interest as Fiona stripped off her sensible Victorian travelling dress, corset and bloomers, and stacked them in a neat pile in the corner. “Ah, I see you have big tits.”

“How dare you!”

“Was that not the right word? I meant your breasts. It’s very important that I know your breast size, so I can correctly formulate the mixture.”

“I suppose that makes sense,” said Fiona, as the dark-skinned slender Indian beauty, wrapped in a green and gold sari, scrutinised her nude figure with an analytical eye. She took a few more pots of strange pastes and powders down from a high shelf, and used a small brass spoon to carefully measure them out into a bowl. She added a quantity of honey to the bowl, and cracked an egg into it. Then, she ground its contexts together into a fine, viscous mixture, a brilliant crimson in colour.

“Lie down,” she commanded. “Do not be afraid. Remember, I do this to the Governess four times a day.”

Fiona lowered herself obediently to the mattress. She lay flat on her back, with Padma stooping over her, holding the clay bowl in her hands. “Now, do not move,” said the Indian woman, severely, scooping out a quantity of the brilliant crimson substance and applying it directly to Fiona’s skin.

“Ah… must you touch me there?”

“The breasts are very important chakras,” scolded Padma, massaging the crimson substance into the aforementioned centres of power. Her strong hands groped and fondled Fiona’s breasts in what might have seemed a very intimate, even indecent way, were she not a health expert performing an important medicinal procedure. Soon enough, Fiona’s breasts had been painted a brilliant crimson with the sticky substance.

“Do you really do this to the Governess?”

“Of course! I have told her the difference in her attitude is most noticeable. Of course, I often tie her up beforehand.”

“Um… why?”

“You may feel a slight tingle,” said Padma, taking another glob of unguent and slipping her hand between Fiona’s legs. “Now, this is another extremely important centre of power.”

“AHH!”

“Yes, that’s a power sound. Well done. You’re becoming stronger already.” Padma took her time rubbing the crimson unguent into Fiona’s pussy, even sliding her dextrous fingers in between the startled Englishwoman’s velvet folds in order to ensure that every last crevice was coated with the substance. “Are you sure you don’t want me to tie you up?”

“That seems most unnecessary,” protested Fiona, as a strange heat began to gather between her legs. The invigorating spice treatment must be working! Her breasts felt oddly hot and tingly, like somebody was holding her uncomfortably close to a fireplace. Brought back memories of boarding school. “Are you quite finished?”

“Just about,” said Padma, applying an extra-strong dollop of unguent to Fiona’s clitoris. “Now, obviously, you can’t put any clothes on for the next forty minutes, or the effect is lost. So I’ll be taking these, and I’ll come back when you’re done.”

“Nobody said anything about forty… wait! Where did you go?” The bead curtain rattled as Padma departed with Fiona’s dress, corset and bloomers, back to her market stall, which was obviously far too exposed to the public for Fiona to even consider stepping into in her current state of undress. She sat up, observing as she did so that the mattress was without sheets, and somehow glued to the floor of the neat little stone cubicle.

Then, she bit her lip.

It was like eating pepper. Or chilis. Or standing too close to the fire. Or the hot feeling in a girl’s bottom after she’s been freshly spanked. Or, alternatively, a tickling, prickling sensation like a thousand tiny, bristly brushes vibrating against the skin. In fact, it was like all of those things at once.

On her breasts and pussy. And, in fact, with particular strength, on her nipples and clit.

Fiona shifted nervously from one foot to another as the heat in her most sensitive regions grew in strength. She tried to brush some of the unguent off her crimson-painted breasts, but even having her arms too close to her breasts caused the sensation to almost quadruple in intensity. Most uncomfortable!

“Um, Padma? I’m not sure I want to do the treatment any more.”

No response from outside the shop. Fiona wriggled in place, standing nude on the stone floor of the cubicle as the sweat began to bead on her brow. Her tits and pussy were starting to feel hotter and hotter. Almost as if, instead of a special invigorating spice mixture, she’d been anointed with a clever combination of burning, tickling and itching powders from ancient Vedic practical-joke formulas, plus an incredibly powerful aphrodisiac that worked best when absorbed through the skin.

And it was getting worse with every passing second. Fiona whimpered, and cast a despairing glance towards the door. She had no clothes on, and the only way out led directly into the very busy public marketplace. She couldn’t go outside and ask for help, or find some cooling fluid to wash the spices off with.

But surely she could tolerate another forty minutes. Right? Forty minutes alone in this little cubicle, tits and pussy blazing with heat, sweat running down her skin, an unmistakable damp feeling between her legs, a perverse impulse to start playing with herself that she had to keep fighting back. The fire burning stronger and stronger with every passing moment, making her twist and dance and squirm…