The sun coming across the bedspread woke me from my sleep. Almost immediately I felt Mhairi stir beside me.

"Rise and shine, sleepy head," she said. "Time for your first day as a fully fledged courtesan."

I growned in response but threw back the covers.

"Remind me why I'd decided this was a good idea again?" I asked.

"Because money. And let's not keep the men waiting." She handed me my dressing gown.

"Something like that."

"Right. You want the new design?"

"Yes." I replied, beginning to brush my hair out. "It's one Keaton will love and let's face it, right now he's the man I need to impress most. Plus. He paid for the extra paint. At least one design needs to be dedicated to him."

Mhairi came to join me, standing beside me in front of the large dresser on one side of our room. The other side was ordained with several large vases of flowers, each one from a different man I'd been screwed by at my official unveiling. The even every courtesan does at the beginning of her career.

As I tried to get up, I winced. Although I'd had a day off to rest, I was still sore and less than perfectly ready to go back to work, but I was also aware the interest on my debt to Daniel was going up at an alarming rate. If I didn't earn a thousand credits each and every day I would go backwards and owe him even more.

"How long do you need to get ready?" I asked Mhairi as I contemplated a warm bath to see if I could soothe myself a little more before heading out.

"Not long. I got everything I could ready last night. I know how long a new painting takes. Didn't want to make us late. I have an early appointment with that special regular I was telling you about."

"The one who buys you those great books?" I asked, already foresaking the idea of a bath. Perhaps when I got back I'd get one. Mhairi nodded, her cheeks flushing red.

Then it was my turn to blush as I hastily dropped my dressing gown, pulled on the blank pale underwear that needed to be painted over and took up the position Mhairi asked for so we could begin painting me.

"Hand me a brush," I said. "I think I can do some of this design myself."

"Gladly," she replied, grinning. She opened some of the colours we needed as I opened the others, and then, together we got to work, her starting on my feet while I worked on my other hand.

This design was far simpler, a mix of flames and dark colours, allowing us to work faster than several previous designs. Keaton's favourite place was a club where the flames would appear to dance across my skin, yet the rest of me would blend into the background.

"I still can't quite believe he bought you some more paint. This stuff is so expensive."

"Me neither, but I'm going to make the most of it. You're welcome to use some of the other designs and parts too." I smiled at Mhairi, knowing she didn't dare ask.

I'd managed to encourage her a couple of times in my early days while I'd been veiled, but she had never used a whole design and she tended to stick to clothing that covered up a lot of her skin. It was the least I could do, however to let her use them. This would be the fourth time in only four weeks that she'd gone to the effort of painting a new design across my whole body. It had taken us a very large amount of hours.

"There," she said as she painted the last small section. "All done. You look amazing."

I grinned as I looked over the finished design. It looked amazing, and therefore I looked amazing.

"Thank you so much," I said, going to hug her. She put a hand out to stop me.

"You need to dry remember, and then I need to spray the top coat on to lock it all in place or we'll never get it off in one piece later."

I nodded, exhaling. I'd forgotten about that and almost ruined one expensive outfit.

"Keaton is going to flip when he sees you. What time is your appointment?"

"I don't technically have one," I replied, doing my best to look a little sheepish. "None of the companions think I'm going to be out until tomorrow. I wanted to surprise Keaton. After all, he didn't have to bid as high as he did at the end of my unveiling. I only won the record because of him," I said, sighing as I thought about how difficult that had been.

Even now a part of me wanted to run from my whole life and never look back, but I had no where to go. I'd been cryogenically frozen, riddled with MND and Daniel had paid for me to be both healed and defrosted. I was what this future world called a Resurrected. The catch - I owed Daniel over a million credits. And there was only one way to earn back that kind of money. Serving as a courtesan to a world of sex starved men, the women mostly struck down by a genetic defect fifty years earlier.

It had its perks. I was valuable. And many of the poorer women in today's world would have loved to be accepted into a court and trained to be a courtesan as I had, but I'd had no choice, merely the illusion of it.

"Come on then," Mhairi said. "If you're going to go find Keaton you'll want to do so before one of the other girls gets up and finds him. He likes to take his courtesans back to his personal section of the club. He can be quite reluctant to leave again once he's being served.

"I've heard," I replied, but I hadn't heard as much as I implied. Edward had come to check on me the previous day and told me a little, helping me decide to go out a day earlier than expected, but I still felt vastly unprepared for my new life.

So far all my training had been for getting men to my unveiling. Now I had to make a life as a courtesan, servicing men several times a day and putting together a roster of regular men who would keep me paying back my debt and having spare cash to spend as I chose. But gaining new customers, I'd only been shown one way to do that, and the thought of needing to made me feel sick.

Several times I'd been invited into what was known as a relaxation room. These were sometimes like clubs, but I'd also been in restaurant themed rooms and games rooms. Around the edges of all of them had been sort of booths, some with curtains, others exposed at one end. A courtesan could place herself in one of these, set a low bid amount and then wait for men to show up.

Men then either agreed to pay that amount for something, or if there was more than one interested party would bid against each other. Mhairi had said on more than one occasion that this was often how an early courtesan or one down on her luck would spend her time. If she was performing well and had her pricing right, it was a good way to entice a new regular.

It had never seemed like a particularly enjoyable idea to me, however. The courtesan had literally no idea who would show up. Of course, she could in theory reject any bid, but I'd never seen anyone do so.

There was also an element of trusting the owner of the relaxation room. One of them was owned by an adorable man who'd attended my unveiling. Tomichii. He'd been lovely to me on many occasions and people only gained admittance to his relaxation room on his approval. Of course, it still meant having sex with total strangers, or people I barely knew, but this is something I'd signed up for. It had even happened at my unveiling. One of my invited companions had pulled out at the last minute and sent someone I didn't know in his place. With very little other option, I'd rolled with it, but it hadn't been the easiest.

"Ready?" Mhairi asked, disturbing my thoughts. I nodded, trying to hide my nerves as I followed her out of the room. "You've got your little card, your reader and your tablet, right?"

"Yup." I held up the small clutch purse I had. In it was these three items and a small compact mirror, some tissues and a buzzer that would summon my bodyguard to my side immediately. All I officially needed.

As I entered the common room all the courtesan rooms opened onto I saw not just Edward and Jake waiting for Mhairi and me, our guards while we were out working, but Daniel.

His eyes went wide as he spotted me.

"New design. I wasn't expecting that. Thought you'd save it for when you really needed it." He held out his arms to me as if he wanted to give me a hug goodbye, but I knew this was unlikely. Daniel wasn't sentimental. I was his to make him money and he'd coached me in my new way of life for one reason. Money.

He took a hand and slowly swirled me around in front of him so he could get a look at the artwork.

"Well, you look ready enough. I won't deny I felt mixed about you wanting to go back out today, but you look as if you can handle it."

"I need the money and I don't want another person turning the heads of my companions while I'm out of action."

"Your choice. Come see me when you get back, and good luck."

Daniel handed me striaght over to Edward, who tucked my hand under his arm and walked away with me. Mhairi had already followed Jake towards the door, and she waved to me before getting into the bubble-like car that had pulled up for her.

"I took the liberty of requesting a blacked out car for you today, princess," Edward said. "I figured you wouldn't want anyone to spot you or the new design and let people know you were out before you were ready to."

"Thank you," I replied, my mind already wondering how much extra something like that cost. It was too late to protest now. I couldnt afford to wait for an alternative and Edward was clearly just trying to help.

I took several steady deep breaths as I sat in the car, the machine already hovering across the ground and what passed for roads in the city. My stomach wasn't settled and I'd opted to forego breakfast, but now I was wondering if I should have eaten to settle myself. Another thing that was too late to change.

This early in the day it was fairly quiet, most men doing some kind of work, or still going about their morning. Courtesan life was offset by several hours, most of us staying out intil three or four in the morning and then sleeping until around lunchtime. Our meals were then offset by one, our last happening around midnight.

The wealthiest men operated on a similar schedule, able to afford to stay up late and often only work half days. A few worked whenever they wished, Tomichii's business partner Kioshi being someone I almost always found in his office or in the science lab. It was him I had to thank for being healed, and he was on my mental list of people to visit if I had the chance.

Not only was he the kindest man I'd met, he'd kept my lack of true virginity a secret so I and my court wouldn't be ruined. I owed him everything. In return I was helping him as much as I could with his research.

Before I could think of any more of my companions and how much I wanted to see them, the car pulled up outside the club.

Edward strode out first, the carpet up to the door devoid of any other bodies but the two doormen in black suits and glasses, something familiar enough their presence felt soothing. He held the door open for me and offered me his hand, smiling in a friendly way that spoke nothing of the sexual gratification I'd regularly given him.

As I approached the door the man on the left gave me the briefest of nods and opened the door for me.

Breaking protocal in a way I always did, I looked straight at him.

"Thank you," I said, smiling before I tried to glide into the club. If the bouncer looked surprised I couldn't tell, his eyes hidden, but he seemed to give me an appreciative smile back.

Without another thought to him, I walked inside, my eyes searching for Keaton already. I needed to find my wealthiest companion, and quickly.

Heads turned and stared at me as I moved even deeper, no one hiding their curiosity. I was dressed to be looked at, nothing but panties on my body and paint. Even my breasts were technically on full display, the paint covering them, but leaving nothing to the imagination.

Unable to see Keaton on the dancefloor, I headed to one side of it, down a row of the booths. I'd sat at one a cuple of times while unveiled and my feet seemed to automatically steer me that way. Of course, Keaton wasn't there either, but it was in the far right corner and gave me a good view of all the other booths.

"Auralia," I heard a voice call. Trying to keep my delight to a minimum I turned towards the call. There, coming down the stairs was Keaton. He was wearing a suit, but the shirt wasn't buttoned all the way and a tie hung over his shoulders rather than sat at the base of his neck. "I didn't think you were coming out today."

"Officially I'm not meant to be, but..." I came closer to him, reaching out as he put his hands on my waist and got a good look at me. "I kept thinking about what you said at my unveiling. In the end, I couldn't wait. I hope you don't mind the surprise."

"Ordinarily, I don't like surprises, but I have been very bored and you're so... fuckable. Are you ready to learn to submit to me?"

"If you're ready to teach me," I replied, not missing a beat despite my mind reeling in fear. I had no idea what his lessons might entail, but I wasn't about to let him or myself down. We both knew, I needed his money too much for there to be any other answer.