For six months after the loss of my beloved courtesan, Cordelia Secino, I slept in the coat sleeve of a traveling boot peddler, not caring whether I came or went or what the future held in store. In truth I was a disheartened louse, without ambition or bite, and would have continued so had not the Shakespearean tones of my dear Uncle Thelonius prodded me in a dream, "There comes a time in the affairs of louse and man, if taken at the flood... " I wakened from my long hibernation and saw that it was raining. Droplets of icy water had trickled down the good peddler's sleeve and threatened to wash me from the wrinkle of cloth in which I had so safely nested.
Without pausing to think, I leaped clear of harm's reach, landed on cold ground and hopped beneath a covey of gorse that shook and trembled in the thunderous weather.
Where was I? I could not tell. As the rattle of wagon wheels grew faint, I looked about and saw the first large feathers of snow drifting onto hillsides and into a small lake alive with wind-swept ripples. Immediately I realized that the wagon had carried me many leagues to the northward, far from my sunny Italian country-side... and my heart filled with dread. For what is a louse in winter? What is he to do? Especially a louse without a furry, four-legged home. Twice especially, one languid, lazy, somewhat spoiled louse accustomed to the luxuries of Europe's finest brothel comforts.
I huddled close to earth and cursed my wits for having deserted. But the spirit of Uncle Thelonius did not and soon I was again looking for the flood tide that would carry me away from despair and back into the world of adventure and love.
I had long to wait but when, six hours later, it came, the flood was more than the most ambitious of louse or man could hope for. It was a flood of laughingly breathless female voices.
They came in a band. Eight beautiful, bouncy-breasted girls running from the weather. Their flowery skirts billowed and blew up revealing the rapid movement of rosy-kneed legs and hefty thighs. I caught glimpses of peasant undergarments and shadows of darker curly-bottomed places of those who wore nothing at all beneath their dresses.
Now here was an atmosphere familiar to me. I smiled a louse-toothed smile. Poised in readiness. When the girls passed close, I leaped with all my strength and the spirit of Uncle Thelonius wafted me high to catch hold of an edge of curl. I clung for dear life.
Success. A skirt lowered over my shivering shell of a body and I nuzzled down into the darkness and warmth of feminine surroundings.
It was a bumpy, choppy ride she gave me but I no longer worried. The aroma of love that I breathed in promised me that I had latched on to a girl of great talent. Onward I rode thus, in a condition of drunken happiness, eager to see where our journey would end.
The footfalls thudded over soft earth, then clattered across a wooden bridge, finally paused long enough for a great iron gate to creak open.
"Alfredo will be home," said one of the girls, with premonition of danger quaking in her voice.
"Oh, he certainly must not be," breathed another.
"If so, I will attend to him myself, never fear," said my steed with imperious calm.
"But he is a monster, Griselle."
"Not for me."
"Then you do not know him."
"I have known many men. They yearn to be slaves, that is all."
The gate closed and the running resumed, now swifter, lighter with an aura of stealth. I heard padded steps and the throaty grabble of disturbed geese. A horse snuffed into his feed. Someone rapped knuckles against wet wood.
"Who will let us in?" came a whisper as they waited.
"The eunuch," answered Griselle. "I have arranged it."
"Do you always think of everything?" Admiration didn't flatter her. "If not I, then who will?"
There was a silence. The girls, with good sense, seemed to bow to Griselle's superiority and I, too, felt proud of this damsel upon whom I was being carried.
"Ah, here he comes now, the eunuch."
A trickle of high-pitched laughter. "Ladies, I am most pleased to see you. You have arrived at a good hour."
"Is Alfredo home?"
"Sleeping, never fear."
"With his door bolted, I do hope."
"I know not how he sleeps this night, but heavily, I do assure you."
"We waste time," said Griselle, striding forward.
The company entered what I took to be a castle. Aroma of roast deer wafted strongly in through the barrier of skirt cloth.
Now I yearned to be free of my new mistress' body so that I might have a better chance to look upon her features and to observe how and what she intended, this night, to accomplish.
When the upward path of narrow steps had been climbed to the top, I decided to take my chances. I dropped from my hairy vined place and plummeted earthward. Looking quickly about, I spied a great, smoky-grey feline yawning sleepily beside a cavelike hearth. I leaped and skipped and landed on the rear left paw. There I jabbed with a light bite and woke him completely. The cat stood and raced across the room under my direction.
"You see that we are all assembled and eager for the archers," said Griselle, her voice filled with practicality. "Where are they waiting?"
"Behind the kitchen rooms and eagerly." The eunuch grinned and shook a mass of pale blond hair forward, covering his plump face.
"Bring them then, if we are to have time."
As the eunuch bowed out of the room, I took my first opportunity to examine the features and form of my new goddess.
My keen gaze told me that Griselle was younger than the others but her strength and single-mindedness gave her seeming years. What spoke of her youth was the unlined brow above clear blue eyes that seemed never to have known defeat of any kind. And the dancing, restless light of the fire was but a pale reflection of her joyous lust as Griselle walked the room with great, pacing strides, pausing upon occasion to stroke the head or breast or behind of her companions and assure each in turn that the archers were men of fortune.
"Never mind your fear," she said. "They will pay us well."
At the sound of her voice I nodded to myself with a thrill of satisfaction. Here in the budding was the promise of a great courtesan, a beauty that could share the throne even with the memory of my Cordelia.
Yes, I thought, Griselle, you will conquer every male heart that presents himself. And if you are wise along with your willingness, you will earn a fortune beyond your fondest dreams.
As I look back upon that moment now, I realize how innocent I was. Even I. To believe that a woman could wish for wealth more than for her heart's own true love was perhaps the greatest mistake of my career as a brothel-louse. But I had not time to dwell upon my predictions as a clatter of heavy footsteps crowded the entrance.
The girls squealed in unison as the company of archers stumbled with glittering eyes into the room and fell upon them as though into battle.
In an instant the room became a clamor of squealing femininity. Arms and legs waved, bannerlike. Skirts billowed and were lifted upward to cover faces, while revealing netherparts. Strong, hairy arms searched and found their prizes. Bearded faces blended with the beards between thighs, creating a recipe for lust, baked and bubbled in merry heat.
I conjectured that these girls were troopers, for they giggled and frolicked with the knowledge of sexual employment. All except Griselle, who strode about among them as though searching for some jewel she could not find. She would twist and dance away from every grabbing hand, always keeping herself out of reach by a hair's breadth. Yet I saw that she performed a duty, keeping a sharp watch upon the couples, making certain that no lodger was left without female companionship. Whenever one of the men rose from the holocaust of flesh and stumbled about, Griselle would leap to his rescue and soon enough attach him to some womanly part.
Curiously, I watched the fleeting expressions move across her face. Sometimes her clear, deep orbs would laugh with amusement, sometimes they glinted with irony and I was moved to wonder what she was really thinking behind her continuous actions of leadership. It seemed to me that her heart must be lonely.
As the love games proceeded, I became increasingly certain that Griselle secretly yearned for something or someone which was not available here in this great hall for, little by little, she edged toward the door and, with a last satisfied glance that all was going well, she whirled and disappeared from the company.
I would not let Griselle out of my sight. With a rapid battery of bites I urged the cat from its hiding place and we sped along the walls and out into the corridor, to follow her wherever she might go.
The eunuch was waiting for her in shadows. "Take me to him," Griselle whispered.
"But he sleeps."
The eunuch's protest meant nothing to her. "Then I will wake him."
"Ah, you do not fear his temper?"
Her laugh was a ripple of confidence. "I fear no man."
"Very well."
The eunuch moved forward and I saw that he walked with a slight limp in his left foot. His heavy body swayed like a galleon on rough seas. A blond mass of hair swung about his shoulders and his plump cheeks gleamed in the torchlight that made a path through the twisting ways. Sometimes he would pause and lift a hand as though to stay Griselle's approach to the master's chamber. But at each hesitation, Griselle would laugh with a sneer of lighthearted reproach and chastise the eunuch for being a coward.
There was hunger in her laugh, a hunger that I recognized. The hunger of unrequited love which had once upon a time brought my beloved Cordelia to her downfall. Now here it was again. Was I once more to witness the adventures of a stout-hearted but starved heart?
Through interminable halls we traveled, finally reaching a door bolted closed and guarded on either side by two stiff sentries who relaxed when they saw the eunuch approaching.
They set down their rods between their legs and leaned back against the wall, each taking his fill of Griselle's shapely form.
"The master expects us," the eunuch said, and I knew he was lying.
But the sentries did not question him for this eunuch, like all eunuchs, was the trusted factotum of every castle.
With surprisingly strong movements, he lifted the iron crossbolts and pushed open the door into what I knew must be Alfredo's room.
Griselle paused and stroked her hair. I saw her eyes come alive with anticipation and her lips grow soft with desire.
She swept into Alfredo's bedroom like a true brothel queen. The eunuch padded after her as though he were court attendant.
If Alfredo had been sleeping, there was no sign of it about him now. Indeed he was in bed, but propped up with two massive pillows of down behind his great shoulders. He was an imposing man and immediately I understood the cause of Griselle's admiration. Even dazzling was his reflection in the battle shield which stood at the foot of ,the bed, leaning against one of the posts and throwing off the image of his pale face and dark, tousled hair that grew down along his cheeks and jowls into a trim, pointed beard.
His dark eyes scowled at Griselle. "You have taken long to privilege me with your visit," said he in a grumpy voice. "Mayhap there are other matters on your mind and you do not wish to visit me at all, fair miss. Is that not the case?"
Immediately I understood his disposition. He was conceited and spoiled.
Griselle, undeterred by his less than magnanimous greeting, approached the bedside. "There is nothing and no one to keep my thoughts from thee," said she with quiet truth.
I writhed at the sound of her voice. It was the wrong approach with such a man as Alfredo. He would walk all over her, trample this precious bed of roses. Yet something inside me kept faith, for I knew Griselle had mettle. She was a born leader in her own right and had but to be challenged to show it, I felt sure.
"The girls do not know I have come to you," Griselle smiled, taking his hand and stroking it upon the wrist.
"And if they did?"
Griselle looked calmly into his obstinate, imperious face. "They would call me traitor," she concluded.
Alfredo laughed in a loud, bellowing voice. "Traitor, is it? They come here and treat upon my very own soldiers, thinking to do so behind my back. Whores that they be, what knowledge have these addlepated girls beyond their own treacherous behavior?" He pulled his hand from Griselle's touch and turned upon his side, away from her. "I will have no more of this. Leave me."
The eunuch had made himself quite inconspicuous in one corner of the room. Now he went to stir the fire and some logs fell over with a crackling thud, calling Alfredo's attention to him.
"And you, too, be gone," Alfredo thundered. "I will have no more of petty annoyances."
I felt certain that something gnawed at Alfredo's bowels. Perhaps he was ill and in pain. But, more likely, there had been some occurrence which still chewed him to give him no rest.
Silently the eunuch bowed out of the room, moving backward, unwilling to bestir his master to further fits of temper.
The door closed, leaving Alfredo and Griselle alone.
"What will you have me do to prove my love?" Griselle murmured, staying close to the bedside. "You cannot do it. It is beyond proving."
"You will never, then, forgive me?"
"No. Never. I would sooner forget thee than forgive thee."
The very stones of the wall echoed his assurance. But Griselle was not as yet bested. She walked around to the far side of the bed and knelt to peer directly into his rigid, soldierly features.
"You make sport of me, my lord. How unfair."
Before he could answer, Griselle leaned forward and touched his mouth with her lips, laughing softly as she kissed him, as the certainty of her own love found voice.
He tried to pull away from her but she would not let him go. Clinging to his neck and shoulders, she fell upon the bed and upon him, nuzzling her face against his beard and down into his neck.
"I do love you with all my heart," she protested with a vibrancy that insisted he believe her.
Any man in his right mind would have accepted that she spoke truth but Alfredo, it seemed to me, must be half-crazed for he insisted on attempting to tear himself from her embrace.
Yet the strength of Griselle's love was a match for Aifredo's brawn. She squirmed and wriggled herself upon him full length. Only the coverlets lay between them. She continued to press her body to his and to cover his face, his eyes, his nose, his mouth, with passionate kisses.
"You must love me. You must," she whispered. "I will have it no other way."
The perfume of her flesh and hair invaded him. I saw him give up his breath in a sigh.
"You will never regain my trust," he said against her face. "But I will make love to you. now and teach you, Griselle, to regret... " The rest of his sermon was lost in lustful kissing.
Griselle pulled the coverlet away and snuggled down upon her master's body, intent on making him forget and making herself forget whatever it was that loomed so horridly between them as an obstacle to true love.
Of other delays there were none. Her hands shot directly to the masculine equipment which became upright. There was nothing laggardly about the man now that he gave himself over to erotic occupation. He flung himself into the act with a will, bringing to bear all the forces at his disposal.
Griselle, who knew her work, undid his bed-clothes rapidly and then, with flying fingers, undressed herself.
How could any man, or god, for that matter, resist the body that she brought for offering? Large-limbed and strong, she encompassed him with a straddling position that gave her hips free movement. She appeared to be riding across a great plain and desirous of covering great distances before the break of day.
Alfredo, beneath her, allowed himself to be taken at first, as he tried still to cling to his skeptical attitude. He did not wish to give in to his lust, did not wish so to be made a fool by his own flesh. But what man or louse can dictate to nature?
Griselle was an army unto herself that had to be completely conquered. And Alfredo's warrior heart must have known this. With a great heave he lifted their two bodies together and over-turned Griselle.
"Vixen," he rasped, "may my heart turn black if I ever love thee."
Hard upon that statement he applied himself to the work of quenching the rising stampede of their lust. His fingers found her breasts, and squeezed and pinched their dark nipples. The sensation of his harsh touch spurred Griselle to encircle his hard-muscled legs with her own smooth limbs. Her supple body seemed to become boneless as she bent and entwined and encompassed him, pulling Alfredo to her bosom like a great sybil of old. Their kisses made loud, smacking sounds and they began to devour each other as though for dinner.
Ah, true love, I thought. This must be the very thing.
Yet, even as I settled down to enjoy the spectacle, there came the sound of thunderous hoof-beats approaching the castle from the north. I prodded the cat who, obedient to the unreachable bites stirring her, leapt up onto a window ledge from which I could look out upon the incredible sight beginning to grow clear.
At first what I saw was a blur through the snow yet the sound of horses hooves was unmistakable.
They came on hard and fast, a horde of riders. I could not count their number but obviously they were intent upon surrounding the castle and I froze inside the warm comfort of my cat's ruff.
Moments later Alfredo heard them, too. His ears seemed to stand up and grow red. "Ye gods," he called, pushing Griselle from him. "You have betrayed me into this."
She fell away from him, toppled from the mattress onto the floor and stood up, brushing her bruised knees and feeling herself all over for other damage.
"I do not know who comes," she cried. "You must believe it." And she ran to the window beside the cat and peered out close beside me.
Her face was indeed a map of mixed emotions and whether or not Alfredo believed, I certainly did. Griselle was no traitor. She, too, felt surprised, shocked, horrified by the invaders surging in close.
She raced for her clothing as Alfredo picked up his battle shield. Standing there naked with shield and spear, he made an imposing figure, particularly since the standard of his honor stood quite erected still. It, too, seemed as enraged as the rest of him and seemed ready for every fight beneath its purple helmet.
Griselle dressed in a flash and found herself a small sword and brandished it. "I will fight for you always," she said.
Alfredo glanced at her with steely contempt. "If need be, I will throw you to the viperous dogs, for I know you have done this to me."
There was no question in my mind any longer that Alfredo was a stubborn ass and would, because of this, bring about his own downfall. I hoped with all my heart that Griselle could learn to love another and give up this thick-muscled bull for a creature with more truly masculine wits.
He seemed to have not a brain about him and dashed, forgetting that he was naked, to the door, calling his soldiers to follow as he raced along the corridor, his naked feet skidding now and then on damp stones.
Griselle followed close behind him, the steel flashing in her hand and brandished before her, ready to protect love, honor and the castle. The soldiers clanked behind her and my cat scooted after the brigade, all of us dashing headlong down into the fray about to meet us.
Alfredo, who knew his men thoroughly, burst into the great room where the archers, drunk and sated upon female flesh, had heard not a sound approaching with speedy threat.
There was no time for Alfredo to take them to task over their insobriety.
"To the walls!" he cried. "Eric the Red is upon us! Go for your lives!"
CHAPTER TWO
I have seen many a battle in my time but never the crash of warriors in the cold country.
The alerted archers began flinging buckets of water upon each other and upon themselves in an endeavor to become steady. But each second thus spent was the equal of wasted years.
Wet and dripping, they staggered out into the weather, trying to wipe the fierce barrage of snowflakes from their eyes. Tottering to the defensive walls, they were as children.
Beyond the barricade one could now hear the whinnying of excited horses and cries of attack as the more able crew leapt from their mounts and climbed over the barricade. Arms and legs appeared; heads with helmets that only half disguised flaming red and shaggy beards of the plundering horde.
It was an awesome but colorful sight: the light snow, the flaming color of the attackers, and Alfredo's band with asses turning rapidly blue.
It was an uneven match but Alfredo's band fought desperately on. I saw Griselle snatch a head covering from one of the fallen enemy. Her voice lifted in a fearful cry and, side by side with Alfredo, she flung herself into the fray. It was a desperate, brave attempt and much actual physical strength made of Griselle a fearful foe as she danced around, sharp metal edges flashing dreadfully close to her beautiful head and bosom. With eyes rolling and face grimacing, she felled one man and then a second, her breasts bouncing in defiance, proving to me beyond any doubt that she had not betrayed Alfredo to Eric the Red.
But it was all over in a trice. The stunned archers, subdued, with heads bowed, did not dare, not a one of them, to glance at Alfredo as the conquerors led them back into the castle.
The only sound rending the soft falling snow was Griselle, kicking and screaming, in a refusal to be vanquished. No two soldiers could hold her. Her jaws snapped, and her teeth clamped closed upon the forearm of anyone daring to reach out and grab hold of her.
At last, with a great belly-laugh roar, the leader stepped forward to take Griselle himself. A giant of a man was he, with a bush of unkempt red hair that stuck out in all directions and seemed completely to cover his face. The gash of his mouth was red. His huge nose was a weather-beaten red. Only the blue of his eyes, like two clear chips of sunny Italian sky, laughed down upon her in bright blue admiration.
"So you are the devil," roared he, reaching a brawny arm around Griselle's waist. "I have always wanted to meet the devil face to face. And a beautiful devil she is, too."
His amusement, his obvious enjoyment of her plight, sent Griselle into a furious rage. She began to kick and claw and scream, but all to no avail. For although she was a large woman, Eric the Red himself was such a giant of a man that he could lift her from the ground and carry her bundle of commotion back to the castle, which he did with obvious relish.
I knew what was coming, that Griselle and the other girls would be raped for plunder. I shivered that Griselle's spirit might break under such humiliation. It was a harsh, cruel country into which I had come. Cold does much damage to men's minds, thought I, following after Alfredo whose arms had been bound behind his back and who was, nevertheless, being guarded and accompanied by six wary soldiers.
It was a shabby, sad crew that reentered the castle, to which Eric the Red seemed no stranger as he directed the band to assemble in the main hall. Eric caught sight of a pair of servants shivering in the shadows.
"Meat and drink!" he called to them and, turning to Alfredo, "Leave him here before my eyes."
Alfredo, shoving the guards away from him, stalked forward and stood upon widespread legs, glowering at Eric the Red.
"Set the woman down," said Alfredo, "and we'll talk."
I marveled that Eric had seemingly forgotten the burden encompassed in the crook of his arm. And he did, in fact, set Griselle upon her feet.
"This is your queen, then, this devil," roared Eric, crossing his arms over his mighty chest. He watched her with admiration as she lifted her chin with continuing defiance and did not blink an eye under Eric's steady surveillance.
At that moment Griselle's girlfriends came stumbling and squealing into the room, pushed forward by some soldiers who had gone to search through the other rooms.
"Shame upon you!" shrieked Griselle mightily at the tear-streaked, frightened faces. "These are men, can't you see? And we will conquer them!"
But the girls were deaf to her plea.
"Pull yourselves together," Griselle continued with spirit. "We will make festive sport with these men and conquer them." She turned again to Eric. "It is my wish to entertain the victor. Eat and be merry," said she further. "Take your fill of meat and then my girls will show you joys suitable to men of your station."
Immediately the soldiers' voices rose in a spontaneous cheer. Griselle turned her back upon Alfredo's eyes which seemed to curse her.
Great sizzling platters of meat arrived along with flagons of wine. Eric gave the nod and the soldiers fell upon the nourishment with a will.
"Rally yourselves," pleaded Griselle to her girls. "And go with the men. You need fuel for your fires."
"And you, my lovely," said Eric to Griselle with continuing amusement, "do you not need fuel, also?"
Saying this, he grabbed her by the elbow and dragged her with him to the long table, taking his place at the head of it and pulling Griselle down upon his knee.
Alfredo stood, motionless, watching Eric the Red attack dinner, watching Griselle attack dinner, too. On Alfredo's face was such a menacing promise of revenge that he need not have spoken a word for his curses to be known.
"And you, Alfredo," called Eric the length of the room, "will you not join us?"
"I will eat nothing," promised Alfredo, "until it is your body that is turning on the spit."
"Oh ho!" roared Eric, "will you send vouchers to chase me, then?"
It was as though all the gods of the Niebelung were rolled into Alfredo's flesh. But no one seemed to notice or care, believing that his promises were the oaths of a vanquished lord on his way to death.
"Let him stand there, then," came Eric's edict. And he motioned for the soldiers that had been guarding Alfredo to join their comrades at food.
The atmosphere became increasingly cheerful as the victorious soldiers filled and rested themselves. The band of girls, too, grew more relaxed, seeming to take their direction from Griselle's manner. Did they know what she was thinking? Did they sense that a plan had begun to formulate in the back of her mind? I did not know. All I could tell was that both men and girls had begun to feel very much at home and intended to have a fine night of games and pleasure.
The dinner, a lengthy repast, became playful and sportive. The girls snuggled in close to their new-found lovers. One stroked a greasy beard with seeming sensuous delight. Another fed her lover chunks of roasted meat. Still another giggled, caressing her chosen friend unseen beneath the table. Somewhere a dog growled.
Suddenly, Eric the Red stood and banged his great wine cup on the plans of the table. "Amuse me!" he shouted. "I need amusement!"
Griselle, equal to him, jumped up also and clapped her hands. "Rosette! Frara! To the center of the floor, all of you. Come!"
Taking the lead, Griselle climbed onto the table, jumped from it to the middle of the room while beckoning the others to join her. Continuing to clap her hands in rhythm, she began a hearty dance movement, the spirit of which took control of her hips and shoulders. The other girls, now recognizing what Griselle was about, and also clapping their hands in rhythm, began to stomp and shake, flinging their heads and bosoms about till they were quivering in every part. The men roared with delight and banged their wine cups and shanks of meat, their hoarse voices rising in suitable tone to accompany the performance.
When all eight girls had found their dancing stride, Griselle began slowly to back away and out from the group, still continuing to direct them in gestures of pantomime. She motioned for them to undress.
Of course they were not completely dressed at all. They had been dragged up in various states of deshabille, their breasts and bottoms only barely covered with fragments of cloth. Now these small pieces were torn away by themselves and the soldiers viewed what seemed like hundreds of bouncing, jiggling nipples, spread in display before them like a fan of peacock-tail eyes in varying shades from the palest pink to the deepest of earth brown.
It was temptation that could not, would not, be resisted. Soon they, too, scrambled over the tables to join the girls in wild dance movements, pounding their feet and grabbing wildly with rough hands for the treasures of flesh flouncing before their eyes. Spirited by the wine, they laughed and hiccoughed, yanked their own beards and pulled playfully the triangular tufts of hair that swayed tantalizingly close.
At last one of the soldiers could withstand it no longer. He grabbed for Frara, lifted her up from the ground and rested her against his own massive physique.
Her thick blond braids swung like twin horses' tails as, quite vertically, she wrapped arms and legs around him.
His knees buckled in a delirium of joy and slowly they sank to the floor, Frara on top. The sight of this released the others and soon a melee of male and female tangles, bodies, voices, groans, rasps, squeals, kickings, bitings, all intermingled in a great orgy of relief. The stench of sweating flesh mingled with the acrid aroma of dark wine. Human bodies sizzled with desire which seemed at any moment likely to send up smoke from these writhing, tumbling centers of passion. Erected banners waved and dived to travel between fleshly hills, burying themselves in the eagerly waiting chasms and crevasses. The hair of my cat stood up with fright and we sped along one wall of the room, looking to avoid the sudden panic.
I watched Griselle extricate herself sinuously from the group. She whispered something into Eric the Red's ear.
A lecherous smile crinkled what was visible of his face.
"So you are a woman of flesh and blood," said he. "Come then."
Griselle led him out of the hall and they proceeded at a rapid pace through the very corridors and stairways that led up to Alfredo's room. Even I wondered at such a thing, that Griselle could make love to this great ape of a man in the very place where she had thrown herself upon the bosom of her one true love.
But I had no time to philosophize. My eyes boggled and my mouth hung agape at the vision of Griselle ripping the clothes from her body and leaping upon this big, hairy beast as though in one swoop she had transferred her soul, yes, her very soul, from Alfredo to Eric the Red.
She bounced herself down upon the hair-stuffed mattress, pulling her lover with her. He came along willingly, the leather thongs and belts of him squeaking and creaking. The great mass of him covered Griselle so completely that all I could see of the girl was the curling of her toes on either side of his feet.
He wasted no time about the business of love, nor did she waste time about her own plan, either.
They were in the very middle of their connection when she said in a whispered, loving tone, "When you leave this castle, my lord, will you take me with you?"
"Take the devil with me?" roared he, trembling on f he point of orgasm. "Sooner would I take with me the witch of the fjords."
I saw Griselle's knees tighten against his hips with the fury of her rejected offer to be his help-mate forever.
"You will throw me away, my lord?"
He, suspended above her now, began the ultimate contractions of pleasure and did not, therefore, answer immediately. But Griselle under-stood without further prodding that Eric's love for her was but a thing of the moment, that her body was his plunder and not his bride, that he would toss her to the boars and the wolves of the forest when she no longer pleased him.
I saw Griselle clench her hands into fists. Her knuckles went white. Then, one hand reached along the bedside and down along the side of Eric the Red until she found the scabbard. Her fingers fondled the knife hilt, then grasped it firmly. Slowly she extricated the gleaming dagger from its home.
As Eric concluded his final convulsion of ecstasy, Griselle plunged the blade between his shoulders and he stiffened again, but with a sensation this time that gave the great warrior peace forever.
CHAPTER THREE
Griselle rolled him underneath the bed and dressed herself quite calmly with slow movements, as though she were preparing for breakfast in the salons of courtiers.
Her complexion had upon it a new glow and she hummed to herself, "Oh, mistress mine, why are you lonely?"
It was a sad but beautiful moment and inspired me to hop from my feline abode into a folded crevice of Griselle's skirts. I wanted to be closer to her than heretofore and to stay close to her through the ups and downs of her many trials to come. For I sensed in her soul a yearning that must needs remain unrequited until the advent in her life of some herculean lover. Eric the Red with all his fury had not dazzled her and certainly Alfredo must now be out of the running, conquered and shamed as he was in the halls below. Thread by thread I inched my way northward along her clothing and finally nuzzled near her bosom where I could feel the strong heartbeat that told me my dear Griselle was hot with uncertainly about what the future had in store.
We stood for a while at the window, looking out to where a lacquered dawn had begun to lighten the horizon. The snow had stopped falling except for occasional flurries. The hills and the ground below were a smooth, bluish white and all seemed peaceful in the world beyond. Peaceful as a mask.
When she had taken her fill of the landscape, Griselle turned with a sigh and we proceeded from room to room where she would duck in her head, evidently looking for someone in particular. I had no idea for whom she searched and was myself surprised when at last we came upon the eunuch, sitting cross-legged before a small hearth fire, staring into it as though with no thought.
"So here you are," said Griselle with relief.
"Waiting," said the eunuch.
"For whom?"
"For the victor, certainly."
"That is I," laughed Griselle strongly. "I, and I alone. Stand up and do my bidding."
The eunuch remained seated as he was. "Is Alfredo dead then?"
"I hope so, but think not."
"And Eric the Red?"
"Now you know."
Silently she held up her hands and spread her ten fingers. "Look upon these," said Griselle, "for you will ever be close to them and do as they direct you." She touched her lips. "You will listen to this speech." She touched her forehead. "And bring to pass the wishes of this brain... on peril of your own life, if you value that frail thing."
The eunuch's plump, rosy cheeks went pale. "And who knows of this?" His voice dropped to a whisper. "That Eric the Red is murdered?"
"Only I and now you. Take the knowledge for your powers and let it bring you wisdom to obey me."
The eunuch scrambled to his feet and stood upon them unsteadily. "I have never had a mistress. It is new to me."
"Then you will learn, and with haste."
"And what of my master?"
Griselle's face twisted with contempt. "He will be as dust at my feet."
"You love him. I see that and hear it in your voice."
Griselle did not deny it but she did not answer his judgment. "There is much to be done which has no concern with Alfredo. I must, for one, convince the soldiers of the Red that it is to me they owe their allegiance now."
"To a woman?" The eunuch's laughter tinkled. "Never will they do it."
"Ah, but they will."
"How?"
"That you will see."
"How come?"
Despising further conversation, she led the eunuch back to Alfredo's bedroom and, combined with his help, lugged the corpse out from its hiding place.
"You must show me the whereabouts of the trapdoor in this room," said Griselle, "so I may dispose of this great carcass before it begins to stink."
"Death stiffens him in all his parts," said the eunuch; gazing down upon the erected member. "I see he died on his way to heaven."
Griselle said, "About your business, eunuch. Where is the trapdoor?"
He waddled across to a great, brown bearskin rug and kicked it aside with the toe of one shoe. "Here, madam." He bent to a brass ring and tugged. "This is the way out."
"Now help me."
Together they pushed and pulled and finally tumbled the body down into the dark pit where it slid along the descending staircase. Then Griselle pulled upon the ring, closed off the exit, and recovered it with the rug. "Tell no one."
"On peril of my life I shall be silent."
They quit the room hurriedly, the eunuch following Griselle, who returned now to the festivities below.
The orgy had proceeded to an advanced stage. Those who were easily satisfied were sleeping in heaps, snoring into each other's bellies. Others, not quite so readily sated, pissed at random against walls and tottered back to view Rosette languidly sprawled out and feeling herself, as though preparing that stage for the next player. The strongest of the membership were going at it in rearward positions of attack, to leave no ditch, no hole, unoccupied.
Griselle glanced about the room. "Where's Alfredo?" said she to herself. "He was bound and helpless. He could not have escaped me."
The eunuch laughed again but said nothing.
Griselle, with the confidence of sobriety among sotted brains, began turning over this figure and that in search of Alfredo but all to no avail. After minutes of active investigation, she decided that Alfredo had, indeed, managed to come upon his escape somehow. And with a great, tearing cry she ran from the hall.
I, bouncing and jiggling upon her bosom, my head pounded with the reverberation of her pounding heart.
We came out into the icy, still air, without a sound upon it. The ground which had looked so white and pure" from above was now disturbed with the prints of horse hoofs.
"There," said she, pointing, "you see, he has done it. He has gone."
Without another word she leaped upon a horse and, kicking it hard upon the flanks, sped off after the trail of hoof prints.
The eunuch, who had not been told what to do, had taken it upon himself to stay at home. Griselle and I raced off alone, over the hills.
Where was she going? Where had Alfredo gone?
I sensed that we were headed for some disaster, for Alfredo had obviously not taken off into the winds but had gone to friends or allies for assistance.
Griselle, in her fury not to lose dominion over Alfredo, was plunging directly into the bull's-eye center of his strength. Yet there was nothing I could do to stop her. I could only hold fast and recount to myself the many times I had seen women destroy themselves for love. How sensible it would have been for Griselle to have stayed in the castle, consolidated her strength there and met Alfredo head-on, warrior to warrior, or compromised some deal with him. But no. She had to do this. She had to chase after him. And then what? Plunge another dagger in between his shoulder blades, too? Was that to give Griselle her ultimate satisfaction? I doubted it.
Yet there was one hope for me. The hope that Griselle knew Alfredo's cohorts. Perhaps she had already estimated her own personal power over them and felt confident that she could sway their opinions sufficiently for her own benefit.
We rode for seeming hours across empty country, so unlike the Italian hillsides with their olive trees and happy farmers for whom I longed. I began to dream of taking Griselle with me back south to where the troubadours would sing her glory and she would find a life of ease suitable to the commanding temperament of her nature. In fact I knew of a particular brothel situation over which she could hold dominion with absolute control and where she, therefore, would be in her glory as well as in bundles of gold.
But Griselle, it seemed, had no care for coins. The thought was mine and mine alone. How was I to communicate to her the happy future that could be hers, if only she knew where and how to seek?
The sky began to gradually clear as we rode and the faint, yellowish sphere of sun appeared around noontime, warming nothing but lightening somewhat our travels. An hour or two after that Griselle's horse began to complain and she had, perforce, to allow him a slower gait which disturbed her patience so that she groaned and moaned and twisted upon the saddle as though in the very arms of torture itself. She stared at the tracks ahead of us, hard and encrusted by the cold. She ground her teeth and cried aloud that there should be no further snowfall until she came to the end of her trail.
I was all for that. The snowfall would destroy us where we stood. So I added my louse voice and called upon Uncle Thelonius to pave the way. Although I could not imagine that the way would be paved anywhere except straight to hell.
Shortly thereafter the horse came to rest upon a high rise of ground. Looking down the far side, I saw the lap of waves upon a long slope of rocky beachfront. The water was a deep green, thick and murky. The waves themselves were sluggish with ice. Griselle relaxed her grip upon the reins and leaned herself across the horse's withers, seeming to stare and squint along the curve of shore.
With rising heart I followed her gaze and saw in the distance what seemed like a small hut built closely to the side of the hill for protection.
She smiled and said aloud, "Alfredo, you have not fooled me this time."
Then, spurring the horse again, she headed straight to the dwelling, no longer paying any heed to the hoof prints which we had been following so closely before.
As we closed in upon the place, I saw that it was not as small or simple as it had first appeared to me. It was not one house but two, built close together, large and rambling, with good, strong roofs and with a stockade around them both. The fencing was built in such a way as to make it impossible to enter the grounds except through a single gate which now stood closed. It could not be opened without calling attention to oneself.
As far as I was concerned we had arrived in the nick of time, for Griselle's flesh was beginning to grow cool, even there in the snuggly center of her bosom, and I knew she must be freezing in her other regions, even though the blood of revenge burned high. The blood of the body has its limits and Griselle had to be close to the edge of those limits in herself.
The horse, too, seemed to realize that we were coming upon the last lap of our journey and he stretched out in a gallop that sped us down over the slope of ground and down onto the beach where his hoofs clattered upon the pebbles and sent them flying behind. His ears stood up and his breath made a rough sound upon the air. Small, foamy lather gathered on his lips and had begun to drip when we finally approached the barricade.
Apparently Griselle had no intention of trying to hide her approach, which was a good thing since there could be no way to do this. She slowed the horse and we trotted right up to the gate. She sat back in the saddle and hallooed at the top of her lungs and then waited for whoever was inside to open hospitality unto her.
What a devilish thought, thought I, for Griselle to believe that the gates would open and she would trip inside as safe as though she were going to her own mother's arms. More likely an arrow would zing out from somewhere and pin her to eternity. I quivered and cowered and thought upon what a louse prayer would be, if there existed such a thing.
And while I was contemplating facing my Uncle Thelonius at last, the gate began to joggle and creak backward.
CHAPTER FOUR
There appeared before us a young man of amazingly handsome visage with masses of straight, white-blond hair falling forward to his eyebrows. He had upon his countenance a beautiful, welcoming smile and the unlined skin, though weather-beaten, still maintained the smoothness of what was appropriate, I estimated, for the age of about seventeen. He had just come out from one of the houses especially to open the gate and so he wore nothing beyond a light leather garment of house attire. I could, therefore, see that he was a person of magnificent strength, yet still on the slender side. Supple and, even to me, a most attractive specimen of manhood.
But the smile, so seemingly innocent, gleamed out from above two hands that held a crossbow directed at Griselle's heart.
"Do you come," said he, "as friend or foe?"
Griselle laughed. "If I come as foe, I will be dead in a moment. So, by nature's good sense, I arrive here as friend."
The boy laughed in turn and approached the horse, holding the stirrups steady for Griselle to dismount, which she did with alacrity and good will.
They stood facing each other very close and I realized that these two were acquaintances.
"How fare you, Griselle?" said the boy. "Alfredo tells me all have suffered much this night." His voice, unexpectedly, was laden with sorrow.
"'Tis true," sighed Griselle. "More than I can say."
"Come, then, and rest yourself. 'Tis God's grace that you have escaped safely."
"And what of Alfredo? Is he inside?"
"No. He's off to gather an army."
At this news Griselle stopped where they had been walking slowly beside the horse. She put her head to the boy's shoulder. "Oh, Leif," she sobbed, but explained no further.
The boy put one strong arm around her for comfort and I felt myself being squeezed between their two bodies so close together. He smelled of honest sweat and I liked him but, at the same time, I understood the torment that Griselle was suffering.
"Never fear," continued Leif soothingly. "Eric the Red will be conquered."
At these words sobs tore from her. Still Griselle did not reveal her secret. With an effort she steadied herself, stood upright, and the pair proceeded to the first house.
They had hardly reached the door when it was opened from the inside by a girl who was blond and young as Leif. She might have been, could have been, his twin sister.
"Oh, it is you," said the girl, breaking into smiles. "The gods have been merciful twice. Come inside, my dear. Rest yourself and bathe. There is nothing to be done. We must wait."
Griselle accepted the hospitality in silence, allowing the girl to embrace her and kiss her upon both cheeks.
We entered a warm, spare room, simply furnished but comfortable. Loaves of freshly baked bread stood in readiness. The girl led Griselle to the scrubbed table, sat her down, poured milk into a large wooden bowl, tore off chunks of bread, dipped them into the milk and offered them to Griselle as though she were feeding a child.
Griselle shook her head. "No, Rondine, I have no appetite."
"You must eat. You must try."
"I would sleep, rather," said Griselle with exhausted, failing voice. "But what I will dream must needs keep me far from rest."
Rondine put down the sopping bread and, agreeable to Griselle's request, led her from this front room into another where there was a great, empty bed waiting.
Slowly, carefully as a mother, she began to remove Griselle's clothing, kissing the bruises that she saw here and there upon Griselle's flesh.
"I will not enquire of you what has transpired," Rondine sighed. "Perhaps I can help you forget some of it."
With these words, she coaxed Griselle into the bed and tucked coverlets about the girl's body.
"Ah, don't leave me," said Griselle. "I wish for sleep but I do not think it will come."
"I will stay with you however long you wish it." Rondine sat down upon the mattress and leaned forward to kiss Griselle lightly upon the lips. "Here, take love," she whispered. "I pray it will soothe you."
Griselle's trembling fingers moved up into the girl's hair and clutched the head, keeping Rondine's face close to her own.
"Look into my eyes," said Griselle. "Tell me what you see there."
Rondine gazed and laughed. "A beautiful girl," she answered. "What more?"
"No more?"
"A loving girl."
"No more?"
"Perhaps I see," Rondine hesitated, "the budding of desire."
"And more," Griselle concluded, grasping Rondine to her suddenly hard.
I felt a new warmth beginning to heat Griselle's bosom and knew that the fires inside had again begun to burn higher. Again there was life and hope.
I wiggled quickly out and hopped upon the pillow as the girls came together in a great embrace, Griselle sighing all the while in an effort to wipe from her memory recollections of the night's events.
Their lips touched softly and searchingly, making gentle sounds of womanly love.
"I will undress myself and come in beside you," said Rondine.
"I cannot wait. Do not move away, dear, sweet one," said Griselle.
Rondine's delighted laugh was muffled against Griselle's hair. Staying close, Rondine managed to wriggle out of her clothing and now the two women, naked together, snuggled under the single coverlet.
For some few moments they lay still, simply pressing against each other, each giving the other a bit of comfort and a great deal more of growing affection.
"I will amuse you," said Rondine.
"With your mouth?"
"With my mouth. With my hands. With my belly. With my... "
"Yes. With everything," said Griselle. "I am happy with you here, Rondine. It is a moment in time that I can give to you completely."
"How lucky I am that Alfredo has gone off," lamented Rondine with acknowledgment of her position in Griselle's hierarchy of love.
But the impermanence of their embraces did not affect Rondine's enthusiasm nor stay her attentiveness. She began to fondle carefully and lovingly the two great breasts that rose eagerly for the touch of her fingers. Griselle's dark nipples peeped out, seeming to need more ardent caresses and Rondine soon complied, ducking her head down and running the tip of her tongue lightly over the nipples and the mounds of flesh surrounding.
"We have touched like this since childhood," whispered Griselle.
"Have you missed it?"
"Not until this moment. But I am grateful for it now, Rondine. This moment I do love you with all my heart."
It was a pretty speech, I thought, and worthy of the courtesan's heart that I knew Griselle possessed. Yet the words she spoke were true enough, for Griselle was not one, I had learned, to mince about with lies. And I felt gratified to see Griselle put away the terrors of the previous night and offer herself now to this lovely, soft girl who felt for her so great an affection.
Their open mouths met, tips of tongues touched, sighs came from them and, like perfume from rose bushes, rose the aroma of fleshly female desire. For the first time I saw Griselle smile with a kind of happiness. She delighted in being fondled and loved and could give herself to the occasion, could give herself to Rondine with utter ease and enjoyment, unconcerned, apparently, with what the morrow would bring upon her.
* * *
As they lay in each other's arms, Leif came to the door and peered in upon them. He seemed not at all distressed, but rather delighted at the spectacle of fleshly pleasure. For a while he stood there, hooking both thumbs in his belt. His face was about to break into a grin but the expression hovered there, uncreated. For beneath it was a deeper feeling. I could tell that he, too, was thinking abut Alfredo and the fate in store for all.
He went, then, silently away. I thought he was gone but no, he returned moments later with one great flagon of steaming brew. He tip-toed into the room and set it down on the table beside the bed.
Griselle turned from her lover and said to Leif, "Ah, you are restless, also."
"Quite so," replied Leif.
Griselle patted the bed. "Sit down. Tell me your thoughts."
"Later," replied Leif, suppressing a smile which finally tipped up the corners of his rosy mouth. "After you have rested, we will speak."
Rondine patted Griselle's head. "She is stuffed with thoughts and cannot keep her mind upon any one thing." There was regret in Rondine's voice.
"Ah, no. That is not so," replied Griselle.
Leif said, "I must not stay. Perhaps the sight of me reminds you of Alfredo and that is not a good thing now."
"All men remind me of Alfredo," said Griselle in a hollow voice. "But I am sure that not all women remind him of Griselle."
Leif chuckled. "You must catch him at a time when all is peaceful."
"And that will be never," Griselle sighed. "You know how it is."
Rondine flung herself upon Griselle's body. "Then do not think upon men," said she. "If you must look so sad when the thought crosses you."
Leif seemed to agree with his sister's philosophy and began to edge out of the room.
When he had gone, Rondine began again to kiss Griselle upon her eyelids. "There is no way that I can soothe you, my dear love?"
"You are doing well. More than I could desire from anyone."
"But I am not succeeding. I see that."
"You are. You are."
The two girls began to disagree with vehemence upon the subject of Griselle's passion and I feared that therefore all passion would be lost between them in argument.
But, happily, I was wrong, for soon Griselle began laughing at the ludicrous situation and kissing Rondine upon her chin and throat, then lower until her head was pressed between Rondine's bosoms which were marvels of creamy pillows encrusted with roseate shields that had stiffened to lovely points of desire.
Griselle, following the path she had begun to make for herself, continued to move her head lower along the girl's willing body and soon her mouth trailed over the curve of belly and lower to where there pulsated that central point of love's altar. Rondine hunched back upon her knees and the red-tipped seat of her throne peeped out from the pinkish slit and seemed to beckon with its shiny button until Griselle laid the flat of her tongue upon it.
"Ah, yes," moaned Rondine. "You have always known how to deal with me."
Griselle laughed where she was and the sound bubbled between the lips of Rondine's love cave. She ran her hands down into Griselle's hair lovingly. "You must be serious," said Rondine, "or we will accomplish nothing."
But it was not possible for Griselle to be serious. Perhaps because her heart was too filled with sorrow. She sighed and laughed alternately, working her tongue deeper into the hidden places and drawing from Rondine continued tones and syllables of intensifying ecstasy. They laughed and rolled together over the mattress that crinkled beneath their weight and sounds echoed the crackling voice that came from a small hearth that was opposite the bed. There was a great deal more light in the room now than formerly and, looking to the window, I saw that the skies had cleared greatly. Many patches of blue showed through the clouds and I felt increasing hope that there would not be another snow this night, which meant, of course, that Alfredo's journey would be speeded upon its way. He might yet return before the morrow, thought I.
There was no doubt in my mind that Griselle's thought was on the same turn as my own, for sometimes she would also gaze through the window and note the condition of the atmosphere.
Rondine's innocence kept her from understanding much of what transpired, silently unbeknownst to her. She shook her blond hair over Griselle's face, stroked and caressed the girl, did all she could to give the girl pleasure. Her body held many treasures which Griselle saw leave to take and soon they were connected, head to foot, using each other with the greatest of enjoyment.
Women in privacy with each other have a different aspect from what they show to the world of men. I saw Griselle give over her need for command and take on the attitude of a tender lover, rolling about, searching to evoke from Rondine the exquisite partnership of pleasure which would bring upon them simultaneously a climax. She caressed the girl with a will, taking on a speed of motion so that her hands became a blur of movement to and fro.
Nor was Rondine herself a sluggard at love-making. The two girls seemed to be galloping about inside each other, slipping and sliding in their lust, flinging their legs wide, heavenward, groaning and grunting and urging each other forward, anticipating and participating in the great game of pleasure, as though competitors for the win.
But the victory came to each, and at the same time. I watched their bodies convulse, buttocks quivering, tightening, all of their parts a-tremble with shivery pleasure and fulfillment that released them from the pressures of time and oppression.
The smooth flesh glinted shiny with sweat and they slipped about upon each other during the height of convulsing orgasm, sighing gradually softer and softer, each reluctant to admit that the conclusion had come upon them.
In fact, so reluctant were they to let go of each other, that the two girls fell asleep where they were, Griselle with her head between Rondine's thighs and Rondine with her head pressed tightly to the triangle of matted hair that concealed Griselle's treasure.
They lay and slept while the sun moved slowly from its zenith down toward the far horizon. Some few times they bestirred each other to languid kisses or to more passionate movements of tongue upon genital. But, ultimately, they slept, taken up by what dreams I cannot say.
For a while I sat upon the pillow, gazing from one sweet body to the next. Then I, too, relented and gave myself up into a long, dreamless condition that I hoped would improve both my strength and my outlook.
I awoke to the sound of a motion in the room close by and heard Leif's voice talking rapidly with the strength and command that belonged, not to a boy, but to a full-fledged man. I could not make out what he was saying for he spoke rapidly and the words were muffled. Yet I could catch snatches of it all and realized it had to do, of course, with the situation at Alfredo's castle, or what had been his castle.
I sighed, knowing that the girls would have to be awakened soon, if they did not, indeed, come awake of themselves from these harsh voices that would inevitably call them to attention.
Yet on they slept, as though reluctant to meet the day and the demands of reality. Nuzzled and snuggled down into the fleshy nest of each other, they seemed such innocent creatures that I could hardly wish for an awakening which must only bring further challenge upon my beloved Griselle. I knew she could not remain lost in dreams forever and so I, myself, meandered over and gave her a gentle but bestirring bite.
She rubbed her eyes, yawned and said, "Where am I?" Then she sighed and her face grew pale with determination as she realized where she was.
With rough gentleness she shook Rondine's shoulder. "Wake. Wake," she whispered hoarsely. "We must flee."
CHAPTER FIVE
Rondine awakened with wide, startled eyes. Instantly she, too, heard the voices quarreling in the room beyond and sat straight up.
"Oh, Griselle, they are our friends."
"Friends, mayhap. But of no service to me without a leader," replied Griselle, rummaging about amongst a variety of clothing. "Where are Leif's garments?"
"Upon his back."
"Has he no others? His cloak, if nothing more, will do."
"Dressing as a man will not fool them."
"I have a different interest."
"A plan?" asked Rondine, hopefully bouncing from the bed and running to her friend. "Tell me."
Griselle, rapidly trying on various costumes, had little time for explanations. As she flung a cloak about her shoulders, she straightened up and tied the hood securely over her head to cover her hair.
"You will not leave without me," said Rondine, understanding Griselle's intention. "I will be your second in command always," said she, pulling on garments of male attire which Griselle had discarded.
"You accompany me at your own peril," Griselle warned, her eyes flashing.
The prospect of danger fell upon deaf ears as Rondine, completely attired, stood back for her friend's approval. "Am I not man enough for you?"
Faced with such a desire to please, Griselle could do nothing but smile and accept. "You are a true friend and lover. Come."
As they swept past the bed, I leaped and caught hold upon the hem of Griselle's cloak, re-signing myself to a fate that held neither peace nor rest. I had come into a land of warriors, Griselle perhaps the greatest of them all.
Griselle, with the speed and agility of a man, ran to the window to scramble up and over to the other side into the court. Rondine followed close behind. Her willingness and loyalty over-came what she lacked in strength, giving her the spirit to shimmy up and tumble out into the snow. They both took slipping steps over to where horses stood tethered and snorting. Griselle climbed upon a mount and Rondine took another. They raced across the yard and out through the gate which had not been fastened securely.
I had no idea if Griselle held in mind a special destination, but I sensed that she had, indeed, some hopeful plan.
How tired I was of all this dashing about! I yearned thricefold for the easier days of yore. Ah, if only a louse could have some influence over a woman's destiny. How I would have headed Griselle's steed southward. But I had all to do at that moment to hang on as we whipped along through the cold air.
We had not traveled far before the sound of horses thundering in pursuit came over the hill, closing the distance between them and us.
"Don't look back," shouted Griselle to Rondine.
But refusing to look upon her fate could not dispel it and soon four men, with Leif in the lead, surrounded the two women in an effort to force their horses to a halt. Griselle, not one to give in readily, pulled upon her reins. Her mount reared, pawing the air and two horsemen were in the path of the dangerous hoofs.
Leif came in behind Griselle and jumped from his steed to hers, landed behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist.
"Give off! Give off!" he shouted. "What you do makes no sense."
Desperately, heroically, she elbowed Leif in the ribs and bit his hand and his shoulder, almost knocking him off balance. But her strength gave out before his and after much tussle and scuffle, Griselle consented to be captured.
When Leif sensed that the girl was quieted, he loosened his grip but did not dismount.
"Where can you go?" said he. "What were you thinking to do?"
Griselle's grim lips were firmly closed, as though forever.
"Can you not see," continued Leif, "that we are forming a band with which to strengthen Alfredo? What you do fights against us and him."
Griselle glanced at Leif sidewise and continued her silence. I understood what she was thinking now.
"I will release you," continued Leif, nonplussed by her silence, "if you will give me your word not to run off again."
He waited eagerly, watching her face, but no answer of assent did he hear.
"Woman, you amaze me," he said finally.
More greatly amazed might he have been had he known that Griselle fancied herself master of Alfredo's castle. Eric the Red had vanquished Alfredo's archers and she, in her turn, had dispensed with Eric himself. The castle, by right, was hers, Griselle thought and she was determined to keep that prize, even from the true light of her life.
Or so thought I.
Griselle's brooding countenance was terrible to behold, as Leif turned her horse around and headed them back in the direction she had so bravely tried to escape. The horses walked slowly, plodding through the deep snow. Only the sounds of Rondine's sniffles disturbed the air with regret and hopelessness.
Slowly the band retraced its steps. But I could see that Leif's conquest was a hollow one. His stout heart had little love for the business of being victorious over women. Especially, he did not care to have conquered Griselle, for he kept talking to her in soothing tones, attempting to explain to her again and again how he wished her success in every venture, how he regretted having to forefend her actions regarding Alfredo. He spoke close to her cheek and gazed upon her countenance with loving looks. I could feel the yearning of his heart for her to relent and understand his feelings.
Griselle, however, stubbornly remained deaf to his pleas and pleadings. She could in no wise tolerate defeat and said at last, "If you are a friend to me, Leif, as indeed you say you are, then release me. I will be on my way and you can say to Alfredo, if you so desire, that I never once crossed your path."
Leif's young face wrinkled in deep lines across the forehead, as though he were torn by conflicting loyalties.
"I cannot do it."
"Then you are no friend of mine, Leif. Only an impostor."
He bore up remarkably well, I thought, under the burden of such accusations until the small army reached the abode from which it had started.
And only then did Griselle seem to come to her senses, with decision to do something.
"Leif, I will be pleased to have a word with you in privacy," she said, when all had entered the house.
Leif, all too willing, sprang to go with her into the back room.
Griselle closed the door, flung back the hood, loosing the beauteous masses of her hair which fell forward to frame her face and give softness to her attack upon Leif.
It was a classic attack of femininity upon the male barricade.
"Leif, I see in your eyes that you love me and that you would do me no harm." Griselle's voice, considerably softened, played upon him like a zither at dusk.
Leif's face. crimsoned. "You belong to Alfredo," replied he softly.
"Ah, don't turn your back upon me now, Leif." She approached him and rested her cheek upon his shoulder. "You have been a strong, supporting arm to me. Will you fail a maiden's heart now?"
Unwillingly, his arm went about her waist and grasped her close. "But my strength, too, is promised to Alfredo," said Leif, his voice trembling with the pain of truth. "I can betray him neither in arms nor in love."
"Will you have him defeated, then, by both?"
Leif, surprised, held Griselle away from him and looked directly into her beseeching gaze. "What is it you say to me?"
I could feel Griselle's limbs strengthening with their old bravado. "His castle is taken and this minute, yes, this very minute, my girls are being raped and mauled and shamed. You wait here for Alfredo's return with forces, but when will he come? And what can he save? It will be too late, I tell you, Leif. Now is when you must act. And with me."
It was as though she had spoken heresy. The color drained from Leif's cheeks and in its place the sallowness of dread. "You ask me to become a traitor."
"I ask you to do what is right and strong. Leif, I appeal to your manliness. Do not delay. Do not waste another moment waiting upon Alfredo's return. Come with me. Come now. Help me to recapture the castle and all will he well, you will see."
Leif turned from her in wretchedness and misery. "How you tempt me, woman."
"Give in. Give in. Yield to what your heart tells you is true."
Griselle, wise in the ways of men, stepped in close now and began kissing Leif upon his mouth, praising him continually in murmurs for his strength, his manliness, his stout heart.
She would not permit him an instant's breath away from the touch of her. Her fingers moved like snakes over his body, insinuating themselves to sensitive parts.
"I would love you, Leif," said she. "I would make you my king."
"You would have me turn like an animal upon Alfredo," Leif continued to insist, although with weakening voice.
"Ah, it is a harsh, cruel world in which we survive. And each day is but a hair's breadth from eternity. Would you not like power and dominion? Would you not care to live out the time allotted in luxury? All of us know too well the spirit of Alfredo, how it roars like a beast in the wilderness, devouring all before it when hungry. Is this your friend? Your true friend, Leif?"
Her kiss upon his lips was full now and, for Leif, I could see it was like the crack of doom that split his world open and changed the course of his destiny. He could no longer resist Griselle's appeal, Griselle's ferocity. His arms lifted like young branches in the wind and went round her.
Griselle leaped to attack her victim, covering his face with lush kisses and pulling the clothes away to blaze a trail that her mouth followed eagerly.
She tumbled him onto the bed, the same bed which had formerly accepted her lovemaking with Rondine.
I lay within the fold of her cloak, watching all in safety from the floor. I saw his stiffness rise like a mighty tree trunk. Griselle fondled and exclaimed upon it with surprise and joy that seemed as truthful as it was enthusiastic.
"Ah, brave soldier. Do your duty. Perform well and I will reward you."
With that she fell upon her back and I saw her legs wave high in the air, eagerly awaiting the thrust that came immediately thereafter.
Great gruntings and moanings ensued. The revels of joy swallowed up what was left of Leif's senses. As he plummeted into Griselle, I sensed that he was becoming one with her in spirit as well as in body.
"Love is all! Love is all!" she cried.
And for Leif it was so.
I thought that I should feel sad for him but, to the contrary, I, too, felt as triumphant as Griselle while hard upon each other they rode.
"There is no fury like the fury of a woman scorned," my Uncle Thelonius had quoted to me once. But there was no fury like the fury of Griselle in hot pursuit of triumph. She raged on, clinging to Leif with every part, sucking the honey from him like a giant queen bee in gardens through which I had once meandered. Yet the sunny climes for which I yearned were nothing compared to the heat that radiated from the bodies of these two. Their beautiful muscles were trim and in the peak of form. Their buttocks were very like one another, tight and rounded, rolling now in one direction, now in the other. They swayed in ecstatic combination. Griselle never seemed so much herself as when she possessed the body of another.
But this beauty was not to last, for one of Leif's men came stomping into the room, not at all loathe to interrupt the doings.
"Enough of this!" cried the big fellow. "Alfredo awaits us. Do you delay?"
His words were like a spear that rooted Leif to the bed and he ceased moving.
"Out!" shouted Griselle. "This is no time."
Leif s niggled to sit up. He put his hand across Griselle's mouth. "I will be with you presently," said Leif in a quivering voice.
"You will never be with him," cried Griselle, her words muffled against his palm.
The soldier remained broad and firm in the doorway. "What is this child's play when life and death await us?"
Leif, properly admonished by his conscience in the guise of the soldier's voice, catapulted from the bed as though suddenly repossessed by his senses.
"Is this how you leave me?" called Griselle after him. "Traitor! Lecher!"
But Leif was gone before she could stumble after him and recapture his heart.
CHAPTER SIX
Griselle stood at the window, staring out into the night, when Rondine crept back into the room and came up behind her, unnoticed or ignored.
"Well, you have failed with my brother but not with me. Will I not do?"
Absently, Griselle reached behind her and patted Rondine's behind in a weak effort to console her friend. "My spirit strengthens," said Griselle. "I am alone and so I must be as ten."
"Ah, that's the courage," said Rondine. "What shall we do? Where go we?"
"It has been foolish of me to think that I might find an army that will help me hold the castle. My arthy must be my women. Come, Rondine. We will return and somehow meet fate head-on."
"Good. Good," Rondine smiled. "But first will you not have a bath?"
Griselle, who seemed sunk into a deep silence, went with her companion and allowed Rondine to splash her all over with steaming water and then beat her body with leafy branches. Through it all Griselle stood stolid and bemused, her mind obviously contemplating great things.
Afterward she permitted Rondine to clothe her in the newest garments that Rondine possessed, of deep maroon cloth with pale blue trim. Thus arrayed, Griselle was an astounding, imperious figure, not to be taken lightly.
"Let us go now," said Griselle, when the dressing was completed.
But when they arrived in the courtyard, both women saw that not a single horse had been left.
"It is just like him," murmured Griselle. "Your brother has a cowardly heart."
"He is Alfredo's ally."
"And so was I that," replied Griselle, her words like ice.
"And what becomes of us now?" said Rondine, ignoring the slur upon Alfredo and her brother. "We are prisoner here in my own home."
"Prisoners never," said Griselle. "If need be, we will walk, trudge back to the castle. But we shall, we must, attain it."
Rondine, despite her loyalty, groaned with horror at so harsh a prospect, and so did I. Yet Griselle's eyes burned high and she would not be deterred from her destination.
So they set off at a trudge, wrapping their clothes around them as best they could against the weather. It was, in fact, a lovely evening for the north, with a clear, dark sky and sharp stars. The girls pressed bravely on, sometimes singing to keep up their spirits, sometimes in silence, looking down upon their feet that made pitifully small tracks among the hoof prints.
"What will we find at the castle when we arrive there?" asked Rondine, in hopes of cheering her spirits on.
"I fear to think upon it," replied Griselle truthfully. "There is much work to be done."
"And just ourselves to do it?"
"No. There are Frara and Rosette and the others, my faithful troop."
Rondine came up close to Griselle and touched her arm. "Do you love them so very much then, that you have trusted to leave them in command?"
"Had I a choice?" smiled Griselle to herself.
"No. But now you have me." Rondine's voice was soft.
Impulsively Griselle hugged the girl. "Yes. Now I have you."
Rondine's love shone from her face like a halo, but Griselle seemed far from their conversation. From time to time she would look back over her shoulder. At one moment, fearful, at another moment, hopeful that travelers would overtake them.
At last Rondine looked up at the crescent of moon and murmured, "I cannot go another step."
With that she sank to her knees and began to cry into the snow, her shoulders trembling and heaving with terrible sobs.
"You must find strength," said Griselle, ignoring the human failure.
"Go. Leave me. I cannot."
"If I leave you," said Griselle, looking about her, "I leave you to the wolves."
With a deaf ear to Rondine's pleas, Griselle helped the girl struggle to her feet and they moved away from the trail to a clump of trees that made a bower of snow overhead.
"We will rest here a while," said Griselle. "It is good for me to rest, also."
Griselle huddled up against one brittle tree trunk and closed her eyes with a sigh. It seemed apparent that she did not care whether she lived or died, but that she must sleep.
And so they stayed together in the covey, Rondine rolled into a ball, Griselle looking out moodily upon the path that they had been forced to desert.
Some while passed and the ground began to shake with the echo of thunder. From over the hill came a horde of men, galloping along the same path the girls had forsaken. They were clearly visible in the light of the moon and at their head rode two men that Griselle recognized immediately. A young blond boy and a darker bearded one that brought to Griselle's eyes an expression of new flame.
Instantly she decided upon action, taking but a moment to glance from Rondine to the horde and realized that her only salvation lay in intercepting them.
Waving her arms and shouting Alfredo's name, Griselle ran and stumbled down the hill. The sound of her voice was lost at first among the horses but then Leif spied her, pulled on the reins and came charging in her direction.
Alfredo saw all, overtook Leif and, bending over from the saddle, swept Griselle from the ground and lifted her before him onto the horse.
A great thrill of joy went through Griselle despite herself. I could feel her heart pounding strongly. Then she recollected her wits, pointed to the covey of trees and called to Leif, "Your sister! Your sister! She swoons there!"
Immediately Leif spurred his horse toward where Rondine lay waiting.
"So, vixen," roared Alfredo, holding Griselle tightly and heading back toward his soldiers. "Eric the Red, has sent you to lay a trap, has he?"
Griselle ground her teeth with frustration and twisted about in the saddle enough so that she could fling her arms around Alfredo's neck.
"You will believe nothing that I tell you," she rasped, "so I will keep peace."
"You can never do that," Alfredo laughed with a bitter roar, waiting at the head of his army while Leif returned at a canter with Rondine behind him, grasping her brother around the waist, her cheek pressed tightly to his back.
Alfredo made a gesture and the horsemen made a circle around him. "We will not storm the castle this night," called he. "For the enemy awaits us, alerted, I am sure."
"You change your plans, then?" asked Leif.
"Yes. We shall make camp here and let Eric the Red wait until he is tired of waiting. Then we will come upon him unexpected, as he did upon me and my men." Alfredo's eyes rolled with rage at the recollection. "Then we will swarm over them and trample the life from their veins."
The soldiers who apparently had been traveling for many a mile unrested, gave up a cheer of gladness to have respite. Leif dispatched some, who returned shortly with sufficient wood to kindle and maintain a great, roaring fire that seemed to melt down not only the snow but also into the crust of frozen earth beneath. Supplies from the rear horses were unpacked, wine brought forth and soon the men were eating and drinking their fill as though the tomorrow of battle were forestalled forever.
Griselle who, of course, at every moment realized that Alfredo's plans against Eric the Red were in vain, seemed inconsolable in her private misery. She, and she alone, knew that Alfredo's enemy was herself only. And her heart seemed torn from the poor girl's bosom at the irony of life which had flung her into such a horrid dilemma.
She kept glancing from Alfredo to Leif and from Leif to Alfredo, wondering what private conversations had. taken place between these two men, how much Alfredo might surmise of her true position.
She watched Alfredo pace to and fro in front of the fire, hands clasped behind his back, stomping heavily and packing down the snow with outbursts of rage unvoiced.
At last Griselle could bear it no longer. She went up to him. "Do as you must to me," she cried. "Kill me, if you will, but do not ignore me."
"Kill you? No." Alfredo grimaced, looking her up and down. "I will give you to my men first and let them make sport of you, as you have done with me."
"Oh, my lord, you shame yourself with such a revenge," called Rondine, who had taken care to overhear the conversation.
Alfredo turned upon her. "What do you know of this woman?"
"Everything and nothing," cried Rondine, in tears. "But I know that Griselle is good and her heart loyal to you."
"Fie upon such foolishness!" Alfredo would not believe her. He pulled away from Rondine's tugging upon his cloak.
"If I speak not truth," shouted Rondine in harsh desperation, "may the heavens crack open and lightning strike me where I stand."
It was an unfortunate speech for, at that moment, a great wind blew up, howling like a pack of wild wolves and threatening to snuff out the campfire.
As the soldiers ran to protect it, Griselle took her chance and dashed for a mount.
Spurring the horse forward into the darkness, Griselle did not look back once but Alfredo's voice called after her, "Tell Eric the Red that he will not live to see next Bodin's Day!"
Hot tears bounced out from Griselle's eyelids as she sped back to the castle. She knew, as I did, that Alfredo could have mounted and over-taken her. But he had chosen to let her go for reasons that she could only guess.
Sleepless and wild-eyed, she rode on until at last the castle loomed like a dark hulk on the horizon ahead.
How strangely quiet it all seemed as we approached. One could not conjecture what manner of occupation proceeded inside the walls.
Griselle eased her steed to a walk and squinted as hard as she could for some kind of movement. But even when she approached close to the walls, she saw nothing.
At the western barricade, she climbed upon her saddle and swung over to catch hold of the jutting stones, pulling herself up, one after the next step, slipping on patches of clear colored ice. With fingers raw and bloody, she gained the topmost vantage. Crawling along it, she passed from one guard point to the next. There was not a soldier in sight and readily she gained entrance through a narrow slit onto a balcony that led to one of the many bedrooms.
Once inside, Griselle collapsed upon the floor until her breath returned evenly. She then disrobed, removing the hated garments of masculine attire which covered her body in unnecessary splendor. For her own flesh, as nature made it, was splendor enough. For a long while she stood naked in front of the hearth place, warming herself and thinking what she might do. She groaned from time to time Alfredo's name, with a deep voicing of regret.
This self-indulgence wore itself out shortly. It was time for Griselle to proceed and discover what had occurred during her absence.
Calling Frara and Rosette by name, she ran through the corridors which smelled and reeked of wine wherever she went. Occasionally she stumbled over a sodden, sleeping carcass and recognized the features of a man or maidservant.
Bending to them in turn, she shook their shoulders roughly. "You would never sleep thus in the presence of your master."
"No, ma'am," and up they would spring, shaking themselves all over and trying to regain sobriety and consciousness. Then they would totter off in fuzzy directions, which led them to bump into walls. Griselle watched this performance with sour disgust, flinging oaths and promising retribution for neglect of duty.
"Oh, I can imagine what goes on below stairs," she said to herself aloud. "Where is that eunuch? Where is that half-wit? That good-for-naught."
Temper added speed to her steps as she proceeded below, knowing only too well the scene that would greet her there. Muttering to herself in tones reminiscent to me of Alfredo, she burst in upon the great hall.
She plumped her fists upon her hips. "Up! All of you! Up!" For the scene that she spied upon was exactly what Griselle had expected.
Captors and captives were all tumbled in a heap, with the girls amongst them. Naked breasts and arms seemed to lie about at random, their owners hardly visible amongst the intertwinings. People had fallen asleep, connected as they lay. The great hodge-podge was a rank stew of flesh, well sated.
"Frara, where are you? Frara!"
From underneath a great rubble of humanity, a girl bestirred herself and crept out. She stood uncertainly and came tottering toward Griselle. Her tangled hair was fallen over her face and, somehow, a leather belt had gotten itself tied and buckled around one thigh. She pushed her hair aside with her forearm. "See?" she said, giggling and looking about at the variety of flaccid male parts, "There is not a man of them left standing."
"My second in command," Griselle sneered with enormous contempt. "Is this how I left you? Is this how I trusted you?"
The girl looked at her, puzzled. "But we have done our duty well, have we not?"
"You have done nothing."
"We have made love."
"Is that all? Is that all?"
"Is there more?" replied Frara uncertainly.
Griselle swallowed her curses. "Wake the others. Be about you quick. We have not a jot of time to spare or lose, for the castle will be taken from us."
The girl shook her head from side to side. "Is it ours, then?"
Griselle had neither the heart nor the motive to explain. "Will you get about your business, girl?" then, turning to the room, "Rosette, Wiegelund, Morde! Come!"
In response to her voice, there began other stirrings, and soon other girls crept out upon hands and knees, yawning, laughing, sighing.
They stood in uncertain semblage before Griselle who surveyed their nakedness and bruised flesh. "This is my army," she said to them. "This is what must protect the castle! Ah, I have no hope left. None. But we must do something still. I charge you. Find yourselves male garments and don them quickly so that none shall know that it is women who are in command here."
"I'm sleepy. Pray, let me sleep," murmured one.
"Oh, I have to piss," said another, and squatted where she was to release a long, tremulous stream that trickled backward and forward, rolling about the room.
Griselle put her palms to her eyes and howled into her hands. "What is to become of us?" But then she rallied. "Find clothing, I say. Find garments to cover those female breasts. Hide them. Hide your bellies. Pretend you are men. Be men, indeed. For it is now or never."
The girls, shaken awake by Griselle's determination and fury, scattered amongst the sleeping soldiers, found stockings, boots, and weskits, which they wrapped around themselves in make-shift attire.
"You will have to stir yourselves to the heights of courage," said Griselle. "Now, get you to the walls and let me hear a loud cry when you spy Alfredo coming over the hill."
"Alfredo?" squeaked one, with horror.
"We thought he was gone. Bound and killed."
Griselle's grimace destroyed their objections. "He may have been tied and captured, but not for long. No man has yet been able to take him."
"Not Eric the Red?"
"No. Not even he," answered Griselle softly. "Only women can conquer Alfredo. I will prove it. Now, begone to the walls," said she, slapping behinds and thighs to get the female warriors moving.
"Eunuch," she called, "where are you?"
No answer.
Griselle strode forward into the room and began kicking at the sprawled bodies of men. "Wake! Wake! Sit up, I command you!"
Gradually, one by one, and in pairs, the men struggled to their feet.
"Ah, it is difficult to tell the difference between friend and foe," said Griselle to herself. "What will I do with this miserable crew? Dress and arm. yourselves, for the enemy comes upon us hard."
CHAPTER SEVEN
She had spoken well and thrillingly but the enemy did not come. The eunuch finally appeared from whatever place he had been hiding. He presented himself to Griselle with many bows which she received gracelessly and returned upon him a kick in the behind for his tardiness.
"What have I in you?" said Griselle. "No friend, indeed."
"You mistake me, madam. For who was it, do you think, who oversaw the girls during your absence? Which man, and which man alone was capable of level-headedness?"
"Curses upon your lost erection. I do not pity or believe you," continued Griselle. "For you are still Alfredo's hireling and nothing I can do will change that."
Again the eunuch bowed low. "In that you are quite correct. But I know that you love him and will be his right hand one day."
"It is not as you suspect, eunuch. He comes to storm the castle and I must defeat him. And since I know where your loyalties lie, I will kick you out upon the far side of the wall to run to him at the first sign of a hoof beat."
The eunuch began a stream of high giggles. "He will not come at all, you'll see. All is lost for you before it has begun."
"And how is that? Though I do not believe you, tell me how it is."
"Why, simple, madam. I have sent a messenger to warn him of all that has occurred herein."
"You have told him of Eric the Red? You have spoken the murder aloud?"
"No. Not that."
"Ah, why not? Why not that?"
"There are some things he would find incredible. I learned he would then lose his trust in me if I told him the whole truth. Better to convey what may be believed than have it belittled."
"You are wise. Wise, indeed, eunuch. I wish you were my ally instead of his."
"I would be allied to you both. This I have already told you. For would I could see peace in our time and an end to so much feuding."
Griselle sighed with a sudden release of wistfulness. "Yes. Would it could be so."
A shriek of warning interrupted their discourse.
"There, that is Morde upon the eastern wall," cried Griselle. "Alfredo comes. Do what you will, eunuch. You cannot stop me now."
Releasing a warrior's cry to the men girded behind her, Griselle marched to the battlements. She reached Morde's position in time to see Alfredo and Leif thundering forward in the first pale light of dawn.
The other girls, who had their own style of combat, ran together behind Morde's shriek. And, as the attacking soldiers reached the barricades, the girls began to fling down upon them pots and pans, thigh bones of animals, with such a fury that Alfredo's band was forced to hold up and lift their shields for protection.
During this moment of hesitancy, the men behind Griselle loosed arrows from cross-bows, flung spears and oaths, until one of them, less drunk than the others, shouted, "Stop! Stop! All of you! It is Alfredo I see, Alfredo, himself."
I felt Griselle's heart grow cold as the archers, to a man, stopped their defense and turned suddenly upon the soldiers among them who had been in the band of Eric the Red. It was as though a civil war had burst around Griselle and there was nothing she could do to stay it.
In horror she stood and watched the eunuch waddle forward to the gates and open wide the point of entry, through which galloped Alfredo and Leif in blazing triumph.
"I am lost," said Griselle to herself. "There is no way. For surely he will kill me now, upon this spot."
But, though she spoke hopelessly, Griselle acted on her own behalf, running with her bran-dished sword, straight for Alfredo.
The girls saw her intention. Morde shrieked, "No! No! Surrender. We will all surrender and Alfredo will show mercy upon our female hearts. Griselle, I beseech you, do nothing rash."
The disheartened band of women dropped down from their posts and raced toward the conquering army, climbing up upon the horses and flinging embraces upon the soldiers, kissing them all over and weakening their ambition for blood.
The men were eager enough to plunder women instead of castles and allowed themselves to be dragged down from their mounts. There, in the growing daylight, the girls tumbled upon the warriors, kissing and hugging, giggling and making promises for their very lives. One by one the soldiers dropped their swords and their shields rolled away unnoticed. Amidst the horses walking about untethered, men and women began to entwine and embrace in the strengthening light of day.
Said Frara to one, "Show me your sword. I have the scabbard for it."
"Wench, you will be fucked, I promise you," replied her lover.
Frara's braids swung about her as she tumbled with the man, squeaking and shrieking wildly as though at the height of joy.
Leif called, "No! No! Men, to arms, to arms!" Wiegelund's voice rose in contrariness. "To bed! To bed!" she called above him.
A great barrage of laughter agreed with the girl.
Above the heads of the tumbling horde, Griselle's gaze met Alfredo's stony stare. "You are the lord and master now," she called. "Will you not let the girls have their will?"
"I trust it not," returned Alfredo's voice.
"Trust not love, my lord?"
"Never love. Hate and greed, mayhap, but never love."
I heard in Alfredo's voice the strange, unbecoming sound of disappointment that seemed to echo up to the vaulted sky. It was then that I realized for the first time that, indeed, Alfredo had once loved Griselle. My simple louse heart went out to him for the torments he must have suffered. Torments of imagination, more than of reality.
Rondine climbed off from behind Leif and came running toward Griselle. She flung her arms around Griselle's neck and whispered, "You must not anger Alfredo more than he is already stirred. It is too dangerous."
"I care not."
"For my sake, and for the sake of your girls. Be tractable."
"I have had my fill of caring," replied Griselle, thrusting Rondine from her. "If Alfredo wishes to murder us here in our tracks, let him do so and have it done with."
With defiance and true to her word Griselle moved toward Alfredo, stepping carelessly over connected couples, humping and pumping away, until she stood at the neck of his horse.
"Well, do your worst," she said to Alfredo, "I'll fight you no longer."
"Oh, foolish little mind," called Alfredo to her, "it is not you that I want. It is Eric the Red. What need have I to battle with women? Let them do what they do best as I see here."
"Eric the Red you shall never have," cried Griselle. "That satisfaction will be denied you into eternity."
"How say you that? It is the conquest for which I have come and no one can hold me from it now."
Griselle looked up at him and howled with laughter. "Well, take him, then. I dare you."
"I will. You shall see it."
"And if I do not?"
"Then I swear to you by all I hold dear that if I do not conquer Eric the Red with this right hand, I shall... "
"What shall you, Alfredo?"
"Name the prize yourself, girl. For I will have his head by noon this day."
"I know you shall not. And because I am so certain of it, I will ask nothing in return from you when you fail except that you free my girls... and make me your queen."
"Done!" shouted Alfredo, and flung his spear into the earth for covenant.
With that Griselle half turned and her gaze sought out the eyes of the eunuch, sparkling and glittering in waves of uncertainty and fear.
"Well, then, eunuch," called Griselle to him. "Get you into the kitchen and prepare the wedding feast."
Alfredo, taken aback by Griselle's certainty, dismounted and looked about him, searching for what he expected to be a trap held in abeyance till the proper moment. Yet, of course, he saw nothing for there was nothing to see and Griselle laughed a low laugh at his efforts.
Alfred turned upon her nonplussed but saying nothing.
The sight of her beloved in his usual state of storm excited Griselle and she went to him, moving in close with confidence. Then, boldly, she kissed him first upon one cheek and then the other, stroked and yanked his beard, almost with playfulness.
"Come to me," said she. "Take your fill, victor." And there was irony in her voice.
Alfredo made a movement to stave her off, but Griselle would not be put by. She danced in again, bringing to bear all her womanly charms which were considerable. Her skin, fresh from the weather, glowed. Her eyes burned, twin orbs of desire that combined with a laughing twinkle which but thinly veiled how secure she felt with her secret triumph.
Alfredo, in a great attempt to ignore her, shouted, "I will have the castle now!" as though to bestir his men from their dallyings.
But, of course, this was all to no avail. No chief, not even a god, could stay the energy of men engaged in lovemaking.
"Come with me," said Griselle. "You shall have the castle. For I can give it to you, and I alone."
Her words incensed Alfredo even further and he lunged for her, but she darted away from his reaching grasp and headed for the entry door.
Alfredo, charging after her with great shouts and oaths, nearly caught up with her.
Once inside, with privacy upon them, Griselle felt free to again shower her designs upon him. She flung her arms around his neck and began covering his hairy face with a multitude of kisses.
At first Alfredo attempted to resist. But he, too, was but a man at heart. A man who had gone too long without love. And the true conquerors became Griselle's fingers stroking him in unrelenting caresses that gradually captured her victim.
Standing right there against the wall, she began to undo his garments, reaching inside them for the banner that she would hold and wave triumphantly. When it came to view, she stroked it, fell upon her knees in obeisance, bowing forward with loyalty to the standard of her love. Rapidly she smothered it with loving kisses, caressed and talked and winked at it, watching it grow inch by inch higher beneath her nurturing attentions.
"Ah, loveliness," she whispered. "You do love me. I see it. How eager you must be to obey my wishes." And with that she dove her mouth, using her tongue with alacrity and wisdom upon the purplish helmet that entered against her palate.
For Griselle it seemed to be a tasty morsel which she savored slowly and with eyelids drooping in passion. Soft sounds gurgled in her throat, while Alfredo stood staunchly on rigid legs, still half unwilling to give himself completely, yet being drawn irrevocably to a bull's-eye target at which his standard would inevitably be aimed.
"Wench, wench, be off with you. Leave me."
Griselle ignored him, knowing that his words were empty sounds. For the erected life within her mouth denied his wishes and she, being a wise woman, knew which the better to believe.
"Unmouth me, wench," he said. "I must go to Eric the Red."
Such foolishness on behalf of a chieftain, even I was loath to find believable. Yet I admired Alfredo's determination, which seemed very much like Griselle's own. These two forces, the male and female, if combined into a single unit, would make so formidable a pair that together none could conquer them, I knew. This, I suspected was Griselle's ultimate, dearest wish. And she was going about its fulfillment in the only way that she knew. A circuitous route, but definite.
She moved her head in longer, quicker strokings upon his staff, giving it an energetic friction.
Finally, I saw Alfredo's knees begin to buckle slightly and understood that even he, with all his stubbornness, could not resist nature's rushing current. He closed his eyes and grimaced and I sensed that torrent spurt from him in great convulsions of relief.
At last Griselle leaned back from him and wiped her mouth with the hem of his garment. "But I know you well, my lord," said she. "You have only begun with me now. Come. Take me, as man takes woman in the only complete and ultimate fashion. For I must have you with all my love."
Alfredo looked down upon her and shook his head. He did not understand what drove her to such despairing lust for his body but yet he realized the compliment of Griselle's sacrifice of herself to him and, in this weakened moment, he seemed to become almost civil.
"I could think that sometimes your heart is, indeed, soft for me," he murmured.
"And so is your heart soft," said Griselle," but not this nether part of you, I trust. Pray keep it firm and useful."
She had let go of him with her mouth and took firm possessing hold now with her hands as though loath to give up contact with that instrument of her delight.
Single-handedly, then, she managed to make bare her behind and other regions, disporting about Alfredo to show off to him her nakedness.
"I have a nest for you, a safe harbor. Won't you come and rest there a while?"
Alfredo laughed, a low chuckle. "You are a worthy woman in some respects. But pity 'tis that I dare not trust you."
Griselle's face grew pale. As Alfredo spoke of trust, how she wished and yearned for him to trust her. But how was one to manage such fate as that? Griselle herself could not discover.
" 'Tis enough that you trust my sex," said she, stoutheartedly.
Lifting a leg, she spread the lips of her inviting place and beckoned Alfredo to ride in hard upon it.
Alfredo, accustomed to storming barriers, did not hesitate. He acted immediately upon this advantage and did so with such a mighty thrust of his lance that Griselle was tottered backward. The two of them tumbled forward together. So strong were they, so hardy and so involved with their particular personal battles, that the floor became for them as easy as a bed.
It became readily apparent to me that Griselle reserved for Alfredo a particular and quite profound portion of her lust. I had seen her in bed with both Rondine and Leif. In neither case had she been a slacker. But yet with Alfredo it was as though a different fire stirred and she seemed inspired by erotic muses.
They rolled over and over like children tumbling down hill, adjusting their hips and other parts into more perfect communication. Below the best line these two people understood each other perfectly. One could hear the avid noises of their bodily conversation as first Alfredo pressed his point home and then Griselle received and directed the point of emphasis. To see these warriors thus entwined, exchanging secrets, delivering blows, all their pent-up passion, their loving and their hating suddenly released now was a situation which would do the heart of a louse good. I, too, was warmed in my every part by the exudations of love.
They seemed an oddly mated couple and it wasn't I alone who considered them thus for, as luck would have it, there came down from above stairs the eunuch carrying, for some reason that I could not fathom, a bolt of heavy blue cloth. He seemed to be headed somewhere important with it and, because he could not look down to see his feet for the bolts were between his nose and the ground, he stumbled and tripped over the passionately interlocked fine of Alfredo and Griselle. But with that peculiar nimbleness which is sometimes possessed by fat people, he regained his balance and continued a few steps forward, looking back only briefly to see what he had kicked. Spying that it was his chieftain, coupled with Griselle, the eunuch with great haste began an elaborate series of apologetic expressions.
Of course neither Alfredo nor Griselle paid any heed to such verbiage. I wondered if they had felt the clumsy steps at all. But the eunuch, feeling in peril of his life, began to hop back and forth over them, bending halfway down to Alfredo's ear in a heroic effort to make his apologies heard. What a dance that eunuch did, and with what desperation!
"Ah, my lord. You must forgive."
Hop. Hop over two pairs of kicking thighs.
"You must be certain, my lord, that I would never interrupt your concentrations."
Skip. Leap. Over rolling hips.
The play went on and on and I began to wonder why the eunuch felt so terrified. For he was a smart eunuch, indeed, quite clever. And he must have known, as I knew, that Alfredo was ignoring all his efforts.
It occurred to me then that perhaps the eunuch, in knowing Alfredo well, knew other facets of his disposition of which I was ignorant. And it may be, in all true wisdom, the eunuch was attempting to forestall any future punishment.
At last it was Griselle who lifted her head away from Alfredo's lips and allowed her attention to be caught by the pleading eunuch's high-pitched voice.
She waved weak fingers at him. "Do you see, then, to my wedding gown?" said Griselle, breathily, having used up the major portion of her strength at tasks other than conversation.
"Ah, yes, madam," bowed the eunuch with as much condescension and obeisance as he had ever shown Griselle. It was a particularly irritating attitude, thought I, and threatened, I also thought, to endanger the eunuch's well-being more certainly than his having interrupted their flight with Venus.
"Well, be off, then," commanded Griselle. "And see about the wedding guests."
"Guests, madam?" said the eunuch uncertainly.
"Would I have a wedding feast alone with only your pop-eyes upon us?" countered Griselle from where she lay beneath Alfredo's weight.
"No. Of course not, madam," murmured the eunuch.
"Then write out a scroll and dispatch your men with it." Her cheek was pressed to Alfredo's beard. "Now, begone with you."
I noted a peculiar light come into the eunuch's eyes and did not trust it. Having seen many a traitor in my time, I thought I recognized the signs of traitorous thoughts turning themselves over in his head. With great alacrity, therefore, I hurried to detach myself from Griselle and with some few leaps that took all my strength, I caught hold of the toe of the eunuch's boot and was carried away with him as he hurried down the hall.
My sensitive nature has always thrust me into peculiar situations. I had no idea where the eunuch would take me. But though it might cost me my life, I must know how he intended to carry out Griselle's command.
Around and about the castle we went, peering into this room and that, as though searching for someone in particular.
At last the eunuch came into the presence of Leif, standing disconsolately in front of a fire-place and staring into it as though into a cauldron of doom.
"What news?" said Leif listlessly, without looking up from the fire.
"All is in chaos," replied the eunuch instantly. "Topsy-turvy. I think Alfredo stands upon his head. Certainly his brains seem squashed to me."
"Griselle has addled him?"
"Certainly. As though she has fed him some potion that put to sleep his wits."
Leif sighed. "I have known her since childhood and this is what becomes of the woman."
"No time for philosophy," continued the eunuch. "She commands me to publish abroad the news of her impending troth and I am uncertain, yea, frightened, whether to do so or not."
"And what is the dilemma?" asked Leif, clasping his hands behind his back.
"Merely this, sir. If I do as she commands and the wedding does not occur, I will have made a fool of my chieftain."
"Why so?"
The eunuch came up beside Leif and also stared into the fire. "Imagine this. Imagine the lords and ladies riding in upon the castle and finding bloody walls and battle instead of the festive sport for which they have been called. Imagine Alfredo standing up before them and commanding the men to arms."
"Against what enemy, eunuch?"
The eunuch shrugged his shoulders and sighed. "I know not what enemy exactly, sire. I merely feel it in my bones."
"Hollow bones they may be."
The eunuch nodded. "I cannot trust this Griselle. I know too much."
"And what do you know?"
The eunuch's teeth ground closed as he struggled against his sudden impulse to deliver forth his knowledge concerning Eric the Red.
Leif, sensing in his young heart that something secret was amiss, something threatening and mysterious, turned upon the eunuch and grasped him by either shoulder.
"Do you not trust me, either, eunuch?"
"I trust you, Leif."
"Then speak it. Speak out."
The eunuch shut his eyes tightly and managed to overcome the first impulse against caution. "I have nothing to say."
"You mean you will not talk."
The eunuch tore himself free from Leif's grasp. "I need your advice, sire. Should I publish this wedding or not?"
"Does Alfredo wish the marriage? That is the question."
"How shall I come upon the answer to that?"
"Well, was he present when Griselle commanded you thus?"
The eunuch chuckled. "Yes and no."
"What do you mean, 'yes and no'?"
"He was present, but not present."
"How can that be?"
"He was there, certainly physically there. But he did not hear me."
"Ignored you?"
"Did not hear me."
"How, then, was he otherwise employed?"
"Aye, sire. Most otherwise employed."
"And you did not confer with him to confirm?"
"I could not."
"You were unwise to avoid it. Unwise not to seek out his commendation upon the matter."
"But neither did he say me 'nay,' Leif. He merely said nothing at all."
"But you say he did not hear."
"He mayhap have heard, but it did not register."
"Oh, eunuch, you speak in circles. I lose my patience."
"Tell me what to do."
"Nothing. Nothing at all, of course, until Alfredo sends you. You are not yet to do the bidding of Griselle, for she is not your lady but merely the harlot of the moment."
Instantly the eunuch put one forefinger to his lips. "Speak soft. Speak soft," he whispered.
Leif took a step back and surveyed the chubby man with his masses of blond hair in a tangle about his cheeks and jowls. "I do believe," said Leif, "that you are afraid of Griselle. Is that, indeed, the case?"
The eunuch hesitated. "I have good cause."
Leif sighed. "I will have no more of this dizzy talk. But you are not to leave the castle, nor send our forces astray. That, you see, would only weaken our strength right here where it is needed."
"Against whom?"
"Who knows?" said Leif in a low, foreboding tone. He turned his head slowly once more to stare into the crackling flames. "I have been thinking upon it, thinking upon the future as well as upon the present situation. It comes upon me that Alfredo is mightily short of strength and I fear, I do fear Griselle and her ambition."
"But if I go not, if she finds me, discovers that I have been disobedient to her wishes, I am in peril of my life. Can you not see that?"
"Your life," Leif laughed contemptuously. "Who is not in peril there?"
"Your philosophy answers me nothing. You are not concerned with the fate of a poor eunuch, for he does not brandish sword or spear, does not clatter into battle with a shield, but stays at home, directing the domestics. You treat this eunuch like a cast-off girl, a simple, replaceable servant. You are wrong to do that, Leif. You put an incorrect value upon me."
"Eunuch, I am sorry to offend you. But I must think always upon the holocaust which has occurred. And this I have been doing for some little while now. Eric the Red came from the north and destroyed our peace, showing to us what a wretched, paltry peace it was, indeed. Can you not see that there are other tribes, other hordes, who may descend from the forest and try once more our puny strength, defeat us altogether, absorb our men and drop their seed into our women?"
"You think like a true chieftain," said the eunuch. "And I do admire you for it."
"But I must do more than think, you see. I must find a way to add muscle to our forces."
"But have we no allies to be sent for?"
Leif nodded. "If they would come."
"They would come to a wedding," said the eunuch with a terrible smile.
Leif turned slowly and stared into the eunuch's eyes. "You do have a head upon your shoulders, after all. Go, then."
CHAPTER EIGHT
I had no intention of riding out from the castle upon the eunuch's boot or any other. For, if I left Griselle now, I feared we night be parted forever. And my fate, entwined with hers, could not stand up alone in the lonely north.
The eunuch went again below stairs and scribbled out, in his fine hand, the wedding message upon four skins of sheep. He called then to him boys who had just reached their manhood and gave them each direction. When this had been done and the boys off to the four corners of the land, I left the eunuch's boot and sat upon a kitchen chair some hours, watching the bustle of wedding preparations begin.
It was unhappiest sense of ceremony I had ever witnessed, for the eunuch moved about with a cynicism that infected all the cooks and servants with whom he came in contact. They knew not, of course, exactly why the eunuch smiled so crookedly, but they took it into themselves and passed on the crooked smiles, one to the next, until the very kitchen seemed like a horde of demons, preparing evil potions for the kill, rather than a festive wedding table. I could not look upon it and maintain my stout heart and hopes.
I took relief, however, from the fact that the eunuch had no intention of leaving the castle himself, not for any reason. For out there was danger and in here was whatever protection that might be possible. The eunuch, certainly, was not one to endanger his own skin, not for any reason. Neither Alfredo nor Griselle nor Leif could command his loyalty. He possessed a single, consistent loyalty, which was to himself, and himself alone.
A small spotted hound, waiting upon chunks of meat to be thrown to him, caught my attention and I moved from my resting place to his scruff, thinking to betake myself away from the eunuch's presence. For though I considered him to be an ever-present danger to my dear Griselle, I knew that no good could come of watching him. I knew that what was needed was a strengthening of the little band who worked on Griselle's behalf.
When the cur had finished his repast, he trotted from the kitchen, looking about for some plaything, as mongrels do. And thus was I carried from room to room and enabled to take a survey of all forces.
The castle was in a state of turmoil beyond my wildest nightmares. Even I could not tell who was for or against Griselle, who for or against Alfredo. Soldiers, seemingly leaderless, lolled about, waiting upon directions that failed to reach their ears. I judged these men to be blameless as well as useless, while my heart ached for some strong hand to take them over on Griselle's behalf. But who would do it?
On and on we trotted, the dog in search of pleasure, I in search of a savior.
Hard was I thinking upon this when the cur trotted into a room that contained Rondine in the process of passionate talk with an archer. She sat upon his knee, holding a flagon of wine to his lips, alternately kissing him upon the cheek and urging him to drink. What a graceful, golden girl she was. And though I sensed that some deviltry was afoot, she seemed in her way completely innocent of evil.
"What fine muscles you have," said she, pressing her knuckles into his fat belly. "How I do admire the masculine countenance," Rondine continued, gazing down between his legs.
"You are a fine specimen of health," said the archer, testing her breasts and squeezing them. "Is it not too warm in here for clothing?"
"Ah, yes, I agree with you in that. Let us disrobe and be comfortable."
My cur, who had taken his fill of sniffing around the room, was on his way out of it, so I jumped off just in the nick of time, some special sense telling me to stay here with Rondine and watch.
"Sir, you have left half the wine in this flagon. Would you waste it?"
Rondine spoke as she slowly removed her body from its protective garments. And what a body it was! Her breasts stood high as any snow-covered hill about and her belly was a fine plateau with gentle curves meandering down to that curly lace where each hair glistened springily.
The soldier, with greedy gaze, followed her movements which were delicate, feminine gestures. With one forearm she half-covered her bosom in girlish modesty. This inflamed the archer's passion and he leaned forward to reach for her and his outstretched arm floundered in the air as Rondine danced back a bit from his grasp.
"Will you tantalize me, then?" said he.
Rondine only laughed. "I will tantalize you and fulfill you," she said at last in a soft voice of utmost gentility, which was like a heated sword to the flesh of the archer.
He leaped up and lunged for her but his drunken scrambling was no match for Rondine's nimble steps as she continued to dance away enticingly.
"Catch me if you can," laughed she.
"Catch you I will," mumbled the archer thickly, floundering head on like a blinded bull. He knocked over chairs and tables, roaring with each frustration.
"More wine," coaxed Rondine. "It will give you strength to catch me."
She came round behind him, yanked up his chin and poured the sparkling red liquid between his lips and he gurgled it down obediently. After this, she ran around him in circles and he spun dizzily, faster and faster. Finally, he sank to the floor where, with a great sigh of relinquishment, he began to suddenly snore.
Rondine poised a moment over him to ascertain that he was indeed sleeping and not lying in wait for her. Then she bent to him and began to quickly remove his clothing, donning each piece herself as she retrieved it. When fully clothed in the masculine garments, she pulled her hair with great anguish as though not knowing what to do with it. Then, impulsively, she took the dagger from its scabbard and began to saw away at her tresses.
With great sorrow I watched the golden locks fall about her to the stone. When I looked again at the girl, she had, indeed, as manly an aspect as one could contrive from so feminine a creature.
Hardly had she finished the completion of her disguise when Leif bounded into the room.
"Well done! Well done!" cried he. "Be off with you now, though I hate to see you go."
Impulsively, brother and sister hugged each other.
"It is for the best," sighed Rondine. "Though I know my chances are too slim to think of."
"Then think not upon it, dear sister. Your idea is, perhaps, the only one that may save us yet." He patted her cheek. "But I would go in your place still."
"No, you are needed here."
"I hope it is true."
"You are the strongest of them all. I know it!" cried Rondine. "My absence will not be missed. But for you to leave the castle would leave too great a hole in our strength."
"I do believe this. But it consoles me not."
With a terrible surge of will Rondine tore herself from her brother's arms and ran from the room, crying, "Look for me to return from the south."
Leif, trembling in every limb, permitted his sister to depart without another word to stay her. When she was gone, he put his face into his hands and cried, "Oh, miserable situation!"
But Leif's manly heart did not allow for sadness to overwhelm him long. After some minutes he wiped the tears from his eyes and went in search of Alfredo whose voice was roaring in great temper not many rooms away.
Leif came into the lion's presence without meekness.
"What angers you so this while?" asked Leif without heart.
Alfredo pounded his fist upon the table. "Days we have been here and yet we have not uncovered the presence of Eric the Red. There is some plan, of course. Some great trap to murder us. I can feel it. But I cannot find its origination. I charge you, Leif, we must uncover the man or we tremble for our very lives."
"Where is Griselle?" said Leif, changing the subject.
"I have put her downstairs with her girls. For they will all do us great damage if I do not encase them."
"Mere women? You are afraid?"
"Those words are the words of a boy, a mere boy," roared Alfredo.
"Call me what you will, but you will yet be trothed to Griselle, I feel it. And then the shame will be upon you for endungeoning your very wife."
"I care not about reputation. Triumph makes its own."
"I must see to the girls."
"Let them be."
"Then I will keep a hard eye upon the eunuch."
"Why think you to do that?"
"Alfredo, you have no true friend in this castle, if that true friend be not me. I am disturbed by your inquisitions."
"I am disturbed greatly by what I find here in my own castle. And so will I challenge and enquire of every living thing that walks upon its stones."
"I see not that you are in such great difficulty as you say."
"With traitors in every shadow, Leif, I cannot measure the dangers."
The two men traded words but neither was swayed by the other's arguments. And . I watched those who had been friends begin to grow apart, which was not a pleasant sight. Yet my heart leaped with hope, for when Leif finally left the presence of his angry lord, he proceeded downstairs against that lord's will to the dank refuge into which Griselle and the others had been locked.
Their moans and sighs seeped into the earthen floor and into the wet, slimy walls about them. Morde and Frara clung to each other like children, crying upon each other's bosom. Wiegelund stood with her face to the wall, knocking her forehead against the stones but lightly so as not to bruise herself. Griselle paced about in silence, calling from time to time upon the god of war to descend and help her in the wretchedness of her plight.
With Leif's appearance all the girls turned and blinked at him hopefully through their tears. "Why have you come?" asked Griselle. "Has Alfredo sent you to murder us at last?"
"Nothing like it," spat Leif, as though spitting out his anger with Alfredo. "I have come of my own will solely, and to help you."
"Help us!" cried Frara. "Pray, do help us. Only to escape. We will have nothing more to do with the deeds of men. They are hateful, disgusting creatures and I, for one, will be glad to leave them to their own devices without any aid from me."
Griselle swatted her friend's behind. "Be quiet! You know not what you say." Then, turning to Leif with full face, "And how will you help us, pray tell?"
"As your friend there says, so do I believe. You must abandon this castle and the feud therein. It has nothing to do with you and you must go."
"Nothing to do with me!" cried Griselle. "When Alfredo is my chosen fate?"
"Then choose again. Choose better. He is beneath you."
"How beneath me, Leif? I think I see in your face an unfriendliness toward Alfredo which I had never expected to find there. Look at me. Look into my eyes. Is it so?"
The expression Leif turned upon Griselle was the look of admiration of a boy for the strength of womankind and his cheeks flushed over with other feelings which remained unspoken.
"Think not upon Alfredo anymore," said Leif, taking Griselle by the wrists. "Think only upon your own salvation and leave. There will be another you can love and one who can love you more truly."
"Never," said Griselle. "And there is more to my feeling than love, though you, dear boy, could not possibly understand my heart."
"Your heart, if you follow it, will humiliate your character. Do not let it forestall reason from directing the course of your actions."
"Leif, tell me," said Griselle, brushing aside his fondness, "if we leave this castle, do you think I have a place better to go? All my hopes hinge upon ruling here. I have thought upon it for years."
"Ruling Alfredo, you mean. Not even a god could do it."
"No. Not a god. A woman. And I will. I must."
Leif turned his back upon Griselle and stared down at the floor. In the dim light, one could see the slump of his shoulders. "I do not know what to believe," said Leif to himself. "The thoughts of both men and women escape me and I had thought life was but a simple matter of joy, hunting and sporting and making love. But there is much more I had not suspected and that I wish should be extinguished forever."
"Enough of your philosophy," cried Griselle. "If you wish to help me, as you say you truly do, then go along with my purpose."
"Which is?"
"To marry Alfredo."
"And has he, in fact, consented?"
"He will. He will."
"Your reason escapes me."
"At the last moment I shall reveal it to you, Leif."
"And why not now? It would give me strength and confidence."
"It is not seemly to speak up at this untimely hour."
"What more untimely," laughed Leif with a hollow sound, waving his arm around the dungeon. "What more unbefitting, Griselle, than your circumstance, no? You, who were always the queen of women, are laid low. And still you insist on believing that Alfredo will take you to wife. You have given leave of your senses. The days have been too much for your strength."
"I will hear no more of this!" cried Griselle. "For it does dishearten me."
The girls, sensing that Griselle would turn away Leif's offer of assistance, came in a rush and encircled the two, pleading heatedly, crying, tearing at their hair, and beating the ground. Their voices became a mingling of pleas and beggings that urged Griselle to hear Leif's offer and to accept it regardless.
"Think of us! Think of us!" they cried. "We will starve here and die. So shall you, and what good will that do anything? You can never be queen. Only a dead queen. And will you like that, Griselle?"
Leif grabbed hold of Griselle's hands again and brought them to his chest. "Listen to the good advice of your friends," said he. "They see the situation clearly. And so must you."
But Griselle, stubborn as always, shook her head and her hair swung about to. veil the agony on her features. Who could determine the turmoil roiling about inside her guts? Only Griselle knew what she suffered. Only Griselle recalled the murder she had done, not only on her own behalf, but for Alfredo. Yet she could not reveal it and the very blood vessels stood out upon her neck, surging with the blood's passion that must hold her lips closed until the proper moment.
"So, then, what will it be?" cried Leif at last. "Am I to leave you here to rot in this dungeon, as the girls know so well will happen? Will you allow me to help you not at all?"
"I told you how you must continue," said Griselle. "There is only one way and that is to assure the wedding festival."
"Well, then," said Leif, dropping her hands from his grasp, "that's easy. For the eunuch has dispatched messengers and the people will come. You will have ample chance to play the fool."
Again, a great noise of crying went up from the girls.
"I cannot stay another hour!"
"I faint from hunger!"
"And I from thirst!"
"And I from wretchedness."
"And I from the smell!"
Griselle, in great disgust, turned upon them. "These are my friends? Well, then, be off with you, everyone. Run from this place and never let me see your faces again or hear the sounds of your voices. I know you not any longer."
The girls looked upon Griselle, and Morde said, "We have, none of us, your strength or ambition, Griselle. It would not do for us to stay."
And with that the troop of them rushed to the door which Leif held open, saying, "Go to the buttery. Horses await you there."
The girls scrambled away with mingled sadness and desire for escape.
CHAPTER NINE
As it came later to be told, they rushed with fear and trembling, falling all over each other and one calling to the next, "It is this way out... no, I see a light here... I remember clearly... it is behind us."
Somehow, they found their way from the castle and then, like wild ones, scattered among the various out-buildings until they found the buttery where, behind it, indeed, was a tether of horses.
The girls, good riders all, hesitated no longer but, leaping upon various mounts, made off toward the horizon, not knowing whither they went, consumed only by the desire to be as far as they could from the terror of Alfredo's presence. They rode for miles until the energy of fear subsided. Then, with the first hints of safety upon them; they slowed their horses to a walk and began to argue amongst them as to what they should do. Without a leader they were, indeed, headless and more like a homeless band of gypsies in search of refuge.
"Let us go to the town," cried Morde.
"No," argued Wiegelund. "Soldiers will come upon us there and we will be questioned."
"Why so?" Frara objected. "Why should they question poor women?"
Rosette laughed bitterly. "There is suspicion upon us, every one. Look at our faces, our condition. We reek of trouble."
"Nonsense!" went up a howl of protest, but the protest abated in face of this truth.
It was decided that they should simply head as far as they could from the country and all connection with Alfredo, Griselle, and pretensions to power. But what would befall them else-where none could say and heart drained from the crew as fatigue grew upon them.
Beneath a pall of despair they continued to talk their horses over hill and dale, looking for some likely place where they might rest. But continuing fear of discovery drove them from the main path and into wooded areas where they would be less readily seen.
Yet once among the trees, they again began to argue, for here they could not readily come upon food and the sounds of wild animals stirred old frights anew.
"There is only one solution," said Frara, at last. "We must become a company of traveling entertainers and in that way earn our keep from castle to castle until such time as we find for ourselves suitable husbands."
"Entertainers?" cried Morde. "And what kind of entertainment are we fit for except one?"
"I can sing," said Wiegelund.
"And I play the lute, a little," replied another.
"And we can act plays, if we try," responded a third "But mostly," concluded Rosette, "we are whores and whores we shall remain. For in that capacity will we receive our greatest remuneration."
And so it was agreed amongst them that they would become a sort of traveling brothel which, with time and reputation, might grow into a profitable business indeed.
This hope stirred the spirits of the lagging crew and they decided upon a certain fiefdom to the northeast where they might begin the establishment of their business.
"But how can we go amongst lords and ladies thus?" asked one. "We are a ragged, wretched bunch, more likely to evoke whippings than love.
"It is so," despaired another. "We need a true resting place and change of garments before we can begin."
"But where? Where is that?"
None knew and again a sniffle, then a tear, then a wail, making a chorus of despairing voices.
But they were not thoroughly discouraged, for Morde said, "Let us try for the house of my granduncle. He cannot be more than twenty miles from here."
"Will he let us in?"
"We will override him," laughed Morde. "I have not seen him for close on to seven years and he would not know my face."
"What about the other end of you?"
"Nor that," continued Morde, seriously. "For he is a pious man."
"Oh, heaven forefend," said Rosette. "Piety will be our downfall."
"Well, what would you have us do? Who amongst us enjoys the brains of Griselle?"
"Ho, hum. Such brains I would not have inside my head."
And all felt silent, wistful for the company of their friend whom they had deserted.
"You know how it will be," said Wiegelund. "We will become successful wenches and show ourselves off to Griselle in our full glory. She will be jealous of us then and sick at heart for having ousted us in favor of Alfredo."
"You promise it?"
"I promise it."
"Then let us to my relative's abode and begin such waywardness as will surmount even Griselle's ambition."
When they finally agreed upon the adventure, all remounted and rode off in the direction of the gentleman mentioned.
The house, more of a hut, threw light from its windows that shone for a long distance through the clear, night air. The girls, finding it, gave off a shriek of joy and spurred their horses into a happy canter. Upon reaching the hut, they rode around it several times with glee, finally jumped from their steeds and went to bang upon the door.
"No, no!" cried Morde. "This is not the way. Let us try our bowed heads and modest looks, if we are to evoke his sympathy."
"A good approach."
"The way of wisdom."
"God will punish us for being deceitful."
"God's punished us already. What worse can be done upon us than has already transpired?"
"True. True."
And so, reining in their natural lusty gifts, the girls formed a demure queue and trailed in with penitent, bowed heads as the door swung open in response to Morde's knocking upon it.
The good man stood back, half hidden in his coarse brown cloak, and watched with blinking, unbelieving eyes a troop of girls moving into his modest, candle-lit abode.
"How wonderful are the ways of the Lord," murmured he, stroking the gray hairs of his beard and reaching with one trembling hand for a gnarled walking cane to give support to his surprise.
"We are famished," said Morde unashamedly. "Dear uncle, for the sake of old times, if you remember me, will you not feed me and my friends?"
The last girl shut the door and fastened the bolt. They stood in a ring now, around the man, blinking at him with piteous expression of weakness and solemn, trembling hope.
"The Lord dispenses through my hands," replied Morde's uncle, his eyelids blinking faster as his gaze went from one rosy-cheeked countenance to the next. "It is as though the flowers of heaven itself have arrived here in my humble house. Feed you? Yea, I will feed you and more. Pray be seated and let me serve."
As he began to hobble away toward the place of provisions, Morde flounced after him. "May I not help you, uncle? It is too much for your old hands to do alone. You must not be accustomed to such company as ours."
"But accustomed I shall become." He grinned a snaggle-toothed smile.
"And so shall we become accustomed to your generosity. For it has been long since such kindness as yours has been bestowed upon our suffering heads."
"How can that be?" asked the uncle, tugging at his streaky-colored beard. "What manner of man can turn away such fair, fond joys as these and keep his conscience?"
"What manner of man has conscience these days?" said Morde.
"Never fear, child." He patted her on the side of one arm and squeezed it testingly. "Simply seat yourself and all will be as you desire."
Morde, faint herself with hunger and fatigue, was glad to join her friends at table, who were sitting there, giggling secretly behind their hands and passing amongst each other many a knowing, winking look as they watched the old man take out bread and meat in large amount, emptying his stores this night, it seemed, for a single, festive board. Stores that were to last him, they suspected, at least a month.
Yet he seemed more than willing, more than eager, to do God's bidding, which meant to share his worldly possessions. The girls fell upon the food with a will, ignoring the old man who stood back from the table, surveying all with a bit of a cackle here and chuckle there, occasionally rolling his eyes up to heaven and thanking the powers that be for answering whatever prayer it was he had been praying these many years.
Then he walked amongst them, tapping a head here, a shoulder there, glancing over a bosom to the plate before it and suggesting that, where empty, it be refilled.
"Perhaps," slid he, "some sacramental wine would help us all.
"It can do no harm," said Wiegelund.
"Can do no harm," echoed the others.
"Can do no harm," concluded the relative, and dragged out a great goatskin which, flinging over his shoulder, delivered from its narrow head a thin, arching stream of wine, first into his own mouth and then into the mouths of the girls, one after another, as they passed before it in a kind of ritual performance to the god of merry clays.
The more they drank, the louder they became and soon were holding hands and dancing about the room, inspired by the warmth and safety therein and feeling kindness toward the old gentleman who stood in the center of the ring, turning around slowly to drink in the bouncing, hefty charms that seemed to be raining upon him, at least coming closer.
For the girls, as they danced, forgot their vow of pious pretensions and, because the gentleman was a male, after all, they fell back into their old habits and began, without realizing what they did, to close the circle, finally arriving at such a tight position that his shoulders brushed, as they moved, against each passing breast.
It must be said in the old gentleman's favor that at first he tried to hunch himself in tight so as to avoid this contact. But, seeing that it was all to no avail and that the girls themselves did not take amiss this touching, he gave out a great shout of joy that seemed to come up from the cornucopia of his younger days and allowed himself to be festooned by the ornaments of female limbs and parts.
"Sweet sir."
"Dear sir."
"Kind, generous, sir."
"Young sir."
The flatteries fell upon him, amazing his ears until the old, rheumy eyes lost their bloodshot aspect and clarified.
The girls, very witches of femininity, were able by their merriment and attention to transform their revelries into a very ritual of magic.
Who can say which was the first girl to do it? But one surely took the lead and, with a carting gesture, dared to kiss the pious lips with human warmth.
"Gratitude," said the kisser, "is what I offer you... "And with gratitude I accept," replied the gentleman at no loss of consternation.
The girl giggled, seeing that he accepted with alacrity that single offering which they each possessed in equal measure.
"We shall pray for you," said one of the girls.
"I have prayed enough in my years. The time has come for an end to prayers and for, apparently, the descent of Eden upon me. I give myself to you willingly. It is, no doubt, God's wish that you have come here. And I, as always, do the bidding of that highest Lord without offense of question."
Morde said, "Is this the same man I remember?"
"No," replied he. "This is a wiser creature who wishes to accustom himself to being agreeable, who has served his time as hermit and recluse sufficient long to have worn out his stay in that dominion."
Said Rosette, "We have come to the right place and will make this our abode."
"If you will agree to this, uncle."
"I will agree to everything you girls suggest, for I can tell that you come to me with the dispensations of heaven and it is my place to accommodate your every desire."
Gleeful cheer went up amongst the girls as they there and then decided to make the old man's hut their own private castle, a place to which they could return at any time for any reason.
Because they were girls of generous and high disposition, they would not overlook the courtesy of thanks which they felt due the old man for so lifesaving an offer. Immediately Wiegelund sprang forward, wrapped her arms around his neck and began to smother his wrinkled face with loud kisses.
The shock of this friendly assault made him tremble and list to one side. He flung one arm around Wiegelund's waist and with the other arm he groped the air and finally found the table which he clutched for support.
Morde flung herself, belly forward, upon that very table and thrust her head underneath his arm. Taking his hand, she stroked it through her hair.
Frara, more daring, perhaps, came up behind him, slipped the cowl back from his head and began altogether to remove the cloak. When it was off and discarded, she planted her lips upon his neck and began to squeeze him here and there, as though feeling to see if the sausage were good.
The pious one, accustomed to doing God's will, stood up manfully beneath these series of testings and Frara discovered that God had imbued his parts with sufficient strength unto the day thereof.
The happy crew, taking on further merriments, proceeded to discard their own coverings and soon garments were flying about the room in a vertible storm of disrobings.
The old man's eyes glazed at the sight of rosy-eyed breasts dancing before his vision, no longer hesitating before the riches being so freely and honestly offered. He plunged about among the treasure, snapping at breasts here, there and everywhere like a small cur leaping at flies.
"I know what we shall do!" cried one of the girls.
"I'm ready," answered the pious one before hearing her suggestion.
"We'll play 'Ride the Fox's Tail.' "
"How is that done?"
"Oh, it is a game that takes much skill."
"Explain. Explain and show me."
"You see, I will be the fox," cried Morde, dropping to all fours upon the ground. "Now as I circle the room in this fashion," continued she, moving indeed like a fox, but one with shiny pink haunches that wiggled, "it is for you to catch me by the tail."
The old man looked puzzled. "But where is the tail?"
"Aha!" cried Frara. "It is for you to attach one to her."
"But there is a better way to play it," said Wiegelund, holding ?.he old gentleman by his own tail. "You might, if you wish, do as Morde is doing upon all fours and see if you can pass beyond our barricade."
"No. I think I like the first version better," replied he staunchy. "I can more readily see attaching a tail than having one pulled off. It would seem more in keeping with God's order."
"Agreed."
The girls then all fell upon hands and knees and began scampering about the room in such-like fashion. The old man took his time to find direction, watching the girls go round and round with a simple grin upon his face. He seemed content to stand there and merely observe the doings. His face had the sheen of incredulity upon it as though touched by the very finger of God itself as he observed the swinging of breasts and the undulating of haunches, the scampering of curvaceous thighs and the rapid breathings of bellies. A feminine aroma came from the movement of shiny flesh, which he sniffed in through wide, flaring nostrils as though inhaling the breezes of the sea.
"Do you not play?"
"He hesitates from fear," laughed one.
"No, from puzzlement."
"No, from wisdom."
"I do not hesitate at all."
Promptly he, too, fell upon all fours and began to race about, knocking his bony knees as he hurried to one or another of the girls and attempted to attach the tail to the fox.
At first, of course, he was not adept at the game and, in passing close to one of the girls, he would rear back upon his thighs and thrust the tail forward. But it would land, not upon the girl, only into thin air and he would sigh with mock disappointment. Then he would race on again to make a second effort.
For some little while the girls remained quicker and slyer than he, able to evade the placing of the tail. But soon it became apparent to all that the old gentleman was gaining speed and agility as the girls began losing theirs. It might also be thought that the. ladies themselves soon discovered the greater value in pretending sluggishness. At least this notion came upon Wiegelund who inadvertently, or purposely, paused at a prime moment, just long enough for the old man to make his thrust and secure the tail firmly, victoriously, between the rearward cheeks of his captive.
None of the girlish troop had any knowledge upon the old man's previous experience with such games. But all, no doubt, supposed that he knew not the difference between one passageway and another, that for him the tail could land anywhere with sufficient satisfaction unto himself.
And, indeed, they were right.
No sooner had he fixed himself securely, than he stopped thus, still as a stone.
"I am tired," announced Wiegelund, in mingled defeat and victory.
"Well, screw it in, uncle. Screw it in!" called Morde, cheering him on.
But the old man did not move. He remained transfixed, upright behind Wiegelund's outthrust behind, fastened to her.
"Do you not know how to work it?" asked Frara in giggles.
"Is there no life still in that tail?" called Rosette.
Wiegelund, who was, in truth, the only one to know, responded, "It lives. It lives."
Morde, in an effort to help the game to its conclusion, came up behind the old man, grasped him firmly by his skinny hips and began to move them as though cranking him to get started. "There," she said, "there you go. Now keep on swinging."
As Morde shook him, the old man's face took on a new light and he began to roll back and forth of his own volition, like a cart that had been started downhill. Faster and faster he worked, his cheeks turning first yellow, then pink, then bluish with exertion.
"Keep at it," encouraged Morde. "Stay with the game."
The tail, well greased now, flew back and forth with increasing speed and soon breath began to wheeze from the old man.
When it seemed he could travel no further, a violent trembling descended upon him. He gazed skyward with rolling eyes and suddenly shot hard. His face became like a prune as he shrieked, "Oh, Valhalla!"
Moments later, he fell over Wiegelund's back and collapsed in a faint.
The girls sat back silently, giving him time to recuperate. Finally, Morde saw that assistance was necessary and she approached the connected pair cautiously, peering into Wiegelund's face.
"What have I done to him?" said Wiegelund, not daring to move.
"Blessed him," answered Morde.
"But I think I ought to release him now from that blessing.
"Indeed, it is so."
"Support him, then, while I move forward."
Morde and Frara lifted the old man backward and held him thus while Wiegelund inched forward until he came unstuck from her with a loud sound of a cork popping free.
"He must need sleep now."
"Put him near the fire."
Three girls carried him to the hearth and put him down there gently. They brought garments and covered him with them, bundling him like an infant and breathing into his face in hopes of resuscitating his slumbered spirits.
"Perhaps it is wiser to let him sleep."
"His dreams might kill him."
The girls laughed quietly.
"He is like a youth."
"A virgin, surely."
"Who knows? Perhaps he was untried."
"Well this, then, has been the best initiation."
"It has, no doubt, changed the course of his life.
Morde put her ear to the old man's chest and, satisfied that she heard a rhythm of a beating heart within, called the girls away from him to the dinner table. They partook lustily and mightily of viands and drink, from time to time gazing upon the pious dreamer, satisfied with themselves and with him and the world at large.
"But we must not grow lazy," said Morde. "We must plan upon our occupation."
"Oh, why must we do that already? Can we not stay here a while and recoup our strength? It has been so long since we have been at ease in such a way as this."
"I fear for us, my dears," continued Morde, "that we might grow lazy."
"You sound like Griselle."
"Exactly her voice."
"And looks."
"I am not like she," protested Morde.
"Then let us loll about here yet a while and do not press for occupation."
Morde, overwhelmed by the others' will, sighed and gave in to the general desire. But it did not please her to do so and she fell to her food with begrudging looks flung from one face to the next as she ate in silence.
The girls were not disturbed by Morde's disapproval and soon they stretched and yawned and rubbed themselves and each sought a corner in which to cuddle up and sleep as the pious gentleman himself continued to do.
They remained in this fashion for two days until most of the food had been devoured and all of the wine emptied from the containers. The old man, who seemed intent on perfecting his game of "Ride the Fox's Tail," did not seem to yearn for Cheat and drink of any other sort, but traveled between his prayers and his sport with great vitality and cheer. Nor did it seem to bother him that his provisions were being swallowed down, leaving the larder bare.
"I may, at any time," said he, flexing a skinny arm, "go out and shoot a boar."
"Do it, then," said Morde, "for we run dangerously near to starvation."
Frara and Wiegelund, who were by this time growing tired of the four walls, offered to join the man about his hunting.
"And do ladies know how to deal in archery?"
"We know much, uncle, that has not as yet been displayed to you."
"Oh, I believe it," grinned he, wiping his lips with his tongue. "But you are certain, then, that you can handle bow and arrow?"
"Take us out. Test us," cried Wiegelund. "It will be a delight to your eyes to see us in action."
"I am certain of that," murmured he.
And the girls leaped at his agreeable condition, dressed themselves again in their clothes against the weather and sallied forth to exercise, as well as to hunt for food.
The weather had continued mild and still there was no hint or sign of further snow. A sunny, blue sky smiled down upon the band as it cantered off to the forest and puffs of slow-moving clouds augured well for the days to come. The sound of horse hoofs through the encrusted snow, a muffled, rhythmic beating, played a happy drum sound upon the earth. The girls, filled with high spirits, shrieked into the air simply to hear the sounds of their own voices.
The lusty crew rode on, with the pious old gentleman first at the head, then in the middle and then behind. His horse was, perhaps, not quite as it might have been and began to lose ground in the race.
This the girls did not seem to notice right away and they spurred their own steeds forward with increasing energy. They had almost reached the edge of the forest before noticing that the old man had been left behind.
"Oh, he will catch up."
"Perhaps he is lost."
"One of us should go and get him."
"Who?"
"You."
"No, not I. You do."
"Let us draw straws."
"Oh, what a shameful situation this is," said Morde. "I will go back for him. You stay here and wait upon us and quickly will I return, for he cannot be at a further distance than over that little hill just beyond the boulder."
"Then do not go, Morde. Wait here with us and let us keep watch," said one of the girls, fearfully.
"What concerns you?"
"A woman riding alone."
"A woman riding alone?" echoed Morde. "That is something I had not considered. But the way seems clear enough. I noticed not signs of other travelers."
"Who can tell?"
The question was enough to disturb Morde's original confidence and she hesitated, leaning forward upon her horse's neck and patting him uncertainly, hoping thus to dispel time until sight of the old man would appear on the horizon.
But the longer they waited, the less they saw and it was apparent to all that, somehow, they had, in fact, lost their chief hunter.
"There is nothing for it but I must search him out," said Morde at last.
"You insist upon it?"
"We cannot wait here without him."
"We can go forward and hunt ourselves and then return to the hut with our kill and he will be glad upon that."
"No. There is something I fear," murmured Morde. "It is not likely that we have simply lost him."
"In that case, we pray you, do not go."
"Then join me. Come along and guard me, ladies. Or else, I do believe you speak with your lips and no heart in it."
It was agreed that some of the girls would accompany Morde and others would stay there at the edge of the forest to wait upon their return. It was further agreed that, should Morde and her half of the band not return within a reasonable amount of time, the others would come to see what had befallen.
The search party rode off bravely at full gal-lop until they had achieved the hill's rise. There they reined their horses in suddenly and sat upon their whinnying beasts in mingled horror and fear. For, distantly, they saw the speck of the old man's cloak and he was surrounded by another group of travelers.
"Keep heart. Keep heart," warned Morde in a quavering voice.
But her courage seemed to fall upon deaf ears.
"They do detain him."
"Perhaps no. Methinks they merely question the man."
"But upon what subject? Surely us. Surely they have come in search of us."
"No. No. You are too bold in such a thought," replied Morde. "What needs have that band with us? I recognize not a face among them. And, besides, they seem not to be dressed in soldier's clothing."
"It is a ruse, then, a disguise. For they must be on their way to the castle."
"And yet there is a chance against it," continued Morde.
"What shall we do?"
"I have a plan. Let us speed forward among them and pretend that we have nothing to fear. It is possible that we may learn something to our advantage."
Without awaiting answer, Morde spurred her horse forward. And the others, seemingly with no choice, followed after. The small group pressed on with pale faces and grim countenance, determined to do their best with the evil situation before them. Morde squinted and strained in hopes of recognizing some visage among the unknown troop. Yet the closer they rode, the more their bodies stiffened. For with coming closer, they recognized not only men but ladies, too. Surely it must be a hard day before heaven when women rode abroad without the proper accompaniment of servants.
It was not long before the leader of the unknown travelers spied the girls approaching. Raising a staying hand to the others, he rode out to meet them, which he did, halfway up the incline.
Morde's face became filled with puzzlement as she heard the stranger's call and greeting. For the timbre of the voice was somewhat less than deep and oddly familiar. Yet she could not place the bearing or the mien until the rider had come in very close.
"I do greet thee in peace," said the soldier, stopping his horse in front of Morde's.
"And we do travel in peace."
"Aye, ladies, it is unseemly that you ride alone. And dangerous. If you do travel in our direction, I bid you welcome to join with us."
"And what direction is that?"
"North by west," replied the leader and a bit of blond hair peeped out from beneath his cloak hood.
"To Alfredo's castle, no doubt," replied Morde bitterly, her eyes lowering as she strained to recognize the person addressing her. "And you do have a familiar look, I think. Are you not Leif the Younger, or a close relative?"
"A close relative," laughed Rondine, not yet revealing her identity.
"And what occurs at the castle, other than fighting? Nothing at all, I tell you. Nothing. And you are a foolish crew to travel in that direction unarmed and in every other way, I think, unprepared."
"We are more prepared than you can tell," replied Rondine in a soft voice. She edged her horse another step closer. "Look hard upon my face and know me."
The other girls leaned closer around Morde and stared full upon Rondine.
"Can it be you?" said one, quickly.
"It is."
"Then there is yet hope."
"For whom?" replied Rondine, not certain on whose side the girls had committed their loyalties, for without Griselle at their helm Rondine was loath to trust their thoughts.
"We do not wish to return to the castle," returned Morde. "That is a thing behind us now. We are free from Griselle and will remain so."
The statement answered Rondine's curiosity. "Then you have no need to join our troop, I think. For we return to partake of the victory which Griselle will surely achieve."
"That cannot be," answered Morde, patting her horse's neck. "She is but a single, weak woman, with stout heart, true, but with only herself upon whom to depend. The bloody doings of the castle have overwhelmed the stout heart of many men. It is the extreme of foolishness to believe that Griselle can overcome the obstacles around her."
"You know not all," said Rondine, "but I do not wish to engage your loyalties for I see that it has deserted your hearts. Do go. Do leave us. But speak not a word to anyone that you have seen this band traveling in the direction we move."
A voice of protest came from the girls, objecting to Morde's haughty attitude.
"We do not wish to be deserted, if there is hope," said one.
"Perhaps it is right for us to retain our loyalty for Griselle," said another.
"Well, decide upon it, then," said Rondine firmly. "For we cannot wait."
"If we return with you," asked Morde, "what will meet us?"
Rondine lifted her shoulders. "Trouble and victory. That's all I can promise."
"Victory," laughed Morde. "If you can promise that, then the trouble is naught. But how is it possible for you to give us such a guarantee?"
"Can you not see what is happening?" said Rondine, turning in her saddle. "The people come from every direction. They travel toward the castle."
"To what purpose?" challenged Morde. "You must know of the wedding."
Then quickly, curtly, Rondine described the situation which she had left and, furthermore, retold how she, herself, dressed thus in man's attire, had carried the news of the coming troth to every corner of the land. "Women are good for more than men permit them," concluded Rondine, flinging back her hood and revealing to the girls her true identity.
"You had not fooled me," said Morde in half-surprise. "How did you fool the others?"
Rondine laughed. "With this," said she, and looked down upon the place between her legs.
"An odd bulge for a woman," said one of the girls.
"My hidden weapon," laughed Rondine.
"Show it to us. I do not believe."
"Not here. Nor is this the time. But back at the castle I will display it to you in full glory. That is, if you come with us."
"Why should you need our company?" asked Morde with suspicion.
"Every pair of hands will help, as they say."
"And you are not as certain of victory as you pretend, then?"
"Of victory, yes. Of ease in achieving it, no. Will you come, then?"
It was concluded that a conference between themselves and the others waiting at the edge of the forest would result in the necessary decision. Rondine joined Morde and her half of the band and returned to the waiting group.
There the girls put their heads together to discuss the pros and cons, whispering amongst themselves and flinging covert glances at the mysterious battle weapon concealed between Rondine's thighs. There was much buzz which rose into an argument. For had not their decision been firm concerning Griselle? Were they not promised to a different way of life? A life of ease and possibility of a greater proportion of merriment and much less of bloodshed?
Yet one factor held out firmly against their success and this question was raised among them. If they did, in fact, decide upon proceeding as they had intended... what success would their traveling bring them if the castles to which they went were devoid of occupants? One stared upon the other glumly as it dawned upon them that there would be no audience for their talents, for all the men and women, too, were on their way to Alfredo's abode and so none would be at home in their own to greet the traveling brothel.
After much muddling and disagreement, they came upon a decision of a temporary nature. They would, for the time being, desert their plan until the wedding festivity was concluded in one way or another. At that time they would again return to the road and resume their plan.
With agreement finally reached, the girls took on a lighter heart and all galloped with Rondine back to the waiting others.
"Here are my beauties!" called the pious gentleman as the girls approached. "Thank heaven you have come. There is much bestirring." With much vitality he stood in his stirrups and with rheumy eyes ablaze, brandished his arm like a sword. "The gods will ride with us and bless our journey."
The girls gazed upon him with many a smile, seeing that the old gentleman had been invigorated by their ministrations. It came upon them as a possibility that they had done, for once, a good and godly deed themselves. And so, with renewed heart, they looked more closely upon the lords and ladies and each of the beauties thought upon her own future with renewed hope.
"We have no time to waste in conversation," said Rondine. "Let us go forward."
CHAPTER TEN
I traveled about the castle with my louse eyes boggled with the complexities increasing before me. The indications of the wedding feast were catching on like a fire that had begun to glaze through the castle. The gates would be lowered at odd times during the day for the comings and goings of preparation. Who could remain stony-faced at the prospect of a wedding?
Only Alfredo.
He thought not upon it, nor believed in its possibility. From time to time he would pause and murmur, "Eric the Red," like a curse.
Who heeded him? Certainly not Griselle, who, with Leif at her side, engaged the servants with orders and business to fill a lifetime. Stores were brought up from their resting places, animals were killed and prepared, cloth of incredible richness unfurled.
And still, Alfredo stalked amongst it all, black as the shades of night, his hand ever ready upon the dagger hilt, as though waiting for the great enemy to spring upon him from behind.
Said he to Leif, "I cannot understand it. Where has that devil disappeared? What plan of destruction has he in mind?"
"Perhaps his wits have deserted him," replied Leif.
"Nay, I think not. That red devil knows too well what he does. Still, I do not understand it."
Leif saw that he could not cheer up his friend. "What can it be, then?"
"I think only this," said Alfredo, gripping his sword. "He waits somewhere for armies and will drive upon us once again."
"But be cheered, my lord. We wait for armies, too."
Alfredo lowered a scowl upon Leif. "Aye, that was your dominion, my frail second-in-command. I came to you for succor... "
"And I have not failed thee."
"How do you say no?"
"The wedding troops will be our armies surely."
"They come not with weapons."
"Most assuredly, yes."
The scowl on Alfredo's brow hesitated and then grew deeper. "You are but a boy, still. The hordes of Eric the Red are savage and we will be no match for them, as we were not upon the first occasion. Sodden were my men, sodden and sloppy as jesters. I do not know what has come upon this land of ours. It is like an infection. All wish pleasure and there are no protectors left. We are in an age of decadence. Men have turned to the fooleries of mere babes and women. I tell you, Leif, if there is hope, it be not here." He ran his hand through his thick hair and pulled it. "I would as soon leave this country, leave my property and go."
"To where, my lord?"
"It makes no difference where. I feel more alone here upon my own stones than I would in foreign dominions."
"You are too downcast," struggled Leif.
"You are too dreamy," Alfredo ground his teeth. "I would have the battle now and over with; myself dead upon this floor is a happier thought than all this waiting, yet I know not upon what I wait."
"That is the worst evil, I think." Leif touched Alfredo's shoulder. "Patience is not your greatest virtue."
Alfredo whirled with a roar. "Patience! As though I were carrying child within my belly! Is that what you wish? Oh, go from my face! I cannot bear the looks of you."
Leif took some small steps backward and, seeing that he could not console his chieftain, left him, returning to where Griselle was occupied setting up the great hall in marriage adornments.
"He fares not well," said Leif, coming upon her.
Griselle paused in her occupation. "I have gone to him but can give the man no consolation, for he does not trust me."
"Nor has he reason to do that, my lady."
Griselle smiled. "Is there yet a man alive who trusts in love?"
"If what you do be love," Leif bowed woodenly, "then heaven keep me from it."
"Nevertheless," replied Griselle, "try for faith. I promise you that Alfredo will have all he wished and more."
"You know what he dreams of. One thing and one thing only."
"Yes." Griselle's face took on a glow of secret knowledge. "I know and will supply him with it."
Leif's young face questioned her in silence. "What you do and think escapes me."
"And so it shall. Now begone while I attend to business."
"Yes, Wedding is a business these days," said Leif with an acid twist to his words. "And would I had no part in any of this."
"If you had no part, my friend, then could I charge you with being a deserter. And in the end Alfredo would agree with that. I swear it."
"But you must know something, then," insisted Leif, "and will not tell. Why not spill it and relieve our hearth? It would do much for your benefit."
"I know my benefit," said Griselle strongly. "And how to achieve and attain the ends for which I long."
"Power!" spat Leif.
"Yes, power. But not power alone. More than that. Much more. More than your brain can encompass with its imagination."
"I learn, Griselle, to trust you less and less with each passing hour."
"Then you learn not well." Griselle clapped him upon the shoulder. "Now call the eunuch to me. I have need of him."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
From north and east and south and west came the wedding guests, riding upon Alfredo's castle.
Rondine, with the strength of a man and with male level headedness, had dispatched messengers to apprise the guests of an assemblage place ten miles outside the castle walls. The bands arrived at different times and waited in a growing herd for others to appear and attach themselves to the single troop which grew into a great swell of humanity, but quietly without banners. For all were aware, or sensed, a trouble, unnamed, unseen, lurking upon the wind. Though none would tell of it or murmur a word of question, they came, thought they, in response to Aifredo's call. Loyalty and courtesy to the great lord was the great gift they would bring.
Only Morde and her friends were somewhat distracted from the impending occasion. A gaze would steal from one or the other of them and they whispered amongst themselves whether or not it would be wise to waylay Rondine and insist that she demonstrate then and there the efficacy of the weapon she carried. For it must be a precious object, conjectured they, to be kept so intimately close to her person. They surmised that some great magician had favored her with a present of priceless worth. They talked further and considered that a spell might have been placed upon Rondine, enabling her to enact both male and female parts at the same time. That was a sight that none of the girls had ever seen, and not one amongst them could imagine raptures the like of which Rondine insisted on keeping for herself alone.
"Selfish girl," said Frara.
"Worse than Griselle," replied another.
"We should take her by force, don't you think? And make her prove to us that she is all she says she is."
But they fell silent, for Rondine had not said she was anything, or anyone. In fact, the girl had told nothing but the truth and so all were at a loss as to how to deal with her.
"Nevertheless, we cannot allow her to escape without a demonstration."
"Yes. That is true. We don't know what will greet us when we finally arrive at the castle. We are to have pleasure, so let us take it now."
"It may be our last."
"Don't say that."
"Yet do you deny it?"
Six heads dropped. And the seventh, Morde, cried, "We must live within the moment. Come, girls, come."
With mingled delight and trepidation they cast wary glances upon the unwary Rondine where she rested, dismounted, and at a distance, standing by herself gazing up at the drift of clouds.
Stealthily, the seven dismounted also and strolled with seeming languish in Rondine's direction, coming upon her one by one. They smiled and greeted her, speaking not a word of their inward thought.
Morde came closest and put her arm around Rondine's shoulders with affection. "How goes it for you, lady?"
"Well, I do hope," smiled Rondine directly. "Our travails will soon be over."
"For that we all pray," added Frara, joining the two.
"But we may have another day or so to spend here," continued Wiegelund, walking around directly in front of Rondine and looking into her eyes. "What shall we do to while the time? Suggest something, dear friend, for we grow weary with impatience."
"All grow weary," sighed Rondine.
"All the more reason to find a game or something like to distract us from the heavy hours."
Rondine glanced over her shoulder at the people lolling and eating at camp. "It is too large a group for play and I am sure that none have the heart for playing here. Heads consider other revelries."
"Including yours?" said Morde with meaning.
Rondine's cheeks grew a deeper red and she tossed her head defiantly. "I did not say that."
"But I know what goes on in there," cried Morde, pointing at Rondine's temple.
"If you know, then speak it not," said Rondine quickly. "For I, myself, am not as certain."
As she spoke, the girls gathered closer, surrounding her, touching her arm, her bosoms, her shoulder, stroking her hair with caressing gesture.
"We are your friends," said Wiegelund. "I hope you know it."
"I would like to think so."
"And are you a friend to us with equal strength?"
Rondine stared sharply into Morde's challenging expression. "What mean you by that?"
Frara stepped forward and shook her braids with lavish luxury. "I think you know our meaning." She glanced down to where Rondine's clothing revealed that there was mystery behind the cloth.
Rondine suddenly became aware and glanced about her at the ominous crew. "You will not touch me."
As she said the words, Wiegelund's hand shot forward and squeezed the object. "It is soft, yet hard," she cackled. "It will be good. Very good. I know it. I can tell."
Her words were a battle cry to the others. As one person, they fell upon Rondine and dragged her to the earth, rolling her over and over, falling upon her with great caresses and huggings and kisses, while laughing raucously in expectation.
"No, you cannot have it. 'Tis not meant for you!" shrieked Rondine.
"Be still, be quiet. Or we will throttle you."
"Friends. Are these my friends?"
"Then act the friend to us," cried Morde, "for we die of hunger. You know of what sort."
"I cannot give in. Even so, the rest will see us and be startled."
"No one looks. Who cares what girls do amongst themselves?" said Frara.
As Rondine attempted to battle them off, the girls continued with their raping, pulling the clothes from Rondine's body to reveal the object of their delight.
And when it came to view, all sat back with shrieks of pleasure, for they were not disappointed in the prize. It was a large and fabulous totem of pearly pink condition, spongy yet erect, well-shaped to godlike proportions and standing straight up, peering with its single eye at each who gazed upon it directly.
"Wondrous!" said Morde. "It seems to live."
"With a life of its own."
"It must be mine," cried Frara, and leaped upon Rondine with straddled legs.
The object plunged deep into the descending cave and disappeared within it.
"How feels the touch of it?" asked Morde. "Good. Good. And warm."
"It fits you well?"
"Delightful. How it tickles," Frara wiggled and squirmed upon the post, "but lovingly."
"Hurry. Hurry," said Wiegelund. "Do not be selfish."
"I would stay and rest here forever," said Frara. "I would give not this up, if the choice were mine." Her face became concentrated upon her actions as she worked herself up and down, slipping and sliding and moving her hips in rapid, circling motions as though surrounding the battering ram with an army of her own, an army of torrid flesh that would devour all which came within its realm.
Rondine grimaced and squeaked and tried to pull away. "You shame me all."
"For what save you this treasure?" asked Morde, kneeling over Rondine and speaking to her, nose to nose.
"For another."
"Ah, I have it," cried Morde. "You love Griselle and wish to attain her. Fie upon your cursed dreams! She is to marry Alfredo, you tell us, while thinking all the while of stealing her from him with this toy."
"Toy, you call it," interrupted Frara. "Toy of toys, joy of joys."
And hard upon that remark, Frara began to tremble, shaking in all her limbs. And rattling sounds were deep within her throat. Her breath came dangerously fast. Yet the hardy girl was up to her own exertions.
They were a practiced crew and in good trim, unaware that there might be penalties for pleasure. Not at their age, not in their condition, certainly not under the smiling skies.
Reluctantly, Frara gave over her position and Wiegelund took it up while the others held Rondine by legs and arms, nailed to the ground at their insistence.
When each had taken her turn upon the steed, they released the girl, who seemed driven deep into the earth by the exertions made upon her form. She lay panting with eyes closed and tears streaming from her long, blond lashes, hard closed and unwilling to open on the sight of her attackers.
"Now that you have done this," sniffled Rondine, "consider me not your friend."
They let her struggle to her feet and laughingly watched Rondine reassemble her garment, ruffled, wrinkled, and clotted with bits of damp earth mingled with snow.
"Do not condemn us," chuckled Morde. "For we have but tested your instrument. Now all can give you the verdict. How do you find it, girls? Yea or nay?"
A cheer arose amongst them.
"It was a good endeavor," judged Wiegelund. "And you may attack Griselle with it in perfect confidence."
Rondine looked down upon the tool, all wet and glistening with the ooze of seven females. "No longer am I pure," said she to herself. "No longer can I use this with delight of virginal thought upon my only love."
"Oh, fie. Such nonsense," said Frara. "You dream like a child dreams."
But Rondine was not to be consoled and she tore the phallic appurtenance from her body and threw it with all the strength she could muster high into the air.
Heads turned upward to watch the spinning object, silhouetted beautifully against the blue. It seemed like a bird in flight, flopping its double spheres that knocked against each other, beating like wings and finally plummeting forward directly to earth again and pinning itself into the snow.
"There, you have conquered the land," laughed Morde. "You have set your mark upon the earth." She ran around the tool and marked off the area by dragging one foot in the crusted white. "This is your new fiefdom, Rondine. Lord and master, shall you reign forever."
The girls clapped and cheered again. Then, fixing Rondine's hair for her and helping to straighten out the clothing for her where it had been neglected, they brought her back to the assemblage that waited.
And so all continued to wait into nightfall and beyond, until it was assured amongst them that everyone had gathered and none was missing.
"It is time to go, then," said Morde to Rondine. "Do you lead us, or not?"
"For Griselle's sake," Rondine answered grimly, "I will lead you."
