by Rex Sumner
“Your hair looks like shit,” she said. “I’m gonna sort it, make you beautiful like you should be, like.”
Susan was dubious, but the disguise had run its time and she submitted to the hacking. Naomi took a long time, careful not to pull and cutting small amounts at a time. She completed the task as Oengus returned, a brace of fat rabbits in his belt.
The hair on Susan’s head was a uniform, finger span length all over, and stood straight out like a fuzz. Gold, it made Susan look as if she radiated light, and her big blue eyes transfixed Oengus as she looked at him for approval. He fell to his knees, gaping.
“Aine,” he said, his voice a whisper, breathed out so they could barely hear. “Your Majesty, forgive me, I did not know. I will recompense, I will run the Gauntlet, I will hunt the Wild Wolf in your name, Majesty, my life is yours.”
Puzzled, Susan leaned forward and shook his shoulder. “Oengus? Are you all right? What is the matter?”
He shrank back away from her, the blood rushing from his head leaving his skin alabaster white. “Aieee, Queen Aine, I could not know you with your disguise but I have failed you.”
Furious for no good reason, Susan jumped to her feet and kicked him over. “Oh get up, you great lump. I am not your blasted queen, I am the same Susan I was this morning, you were happy enough to fuck me then, not grovel at my feet.” She put her hand over her mouth, not believing she had actually used the f-word.
Her anger turned to confusion and she burst into tears, pain tearing in her womb and she went to the bushes, passing water by the stream and padding her trousers with moss as her monthly bleeding started. The cramps making her irritable, she came back to wagon where Naomi had her arm round Oengus.
“Seems you look just like some fairy queen,” she grinned. “You know these Elves believe in all sorts of rubbish.” She spoke in Harrhein as she rubbed Oengus’ back. “Here, you look rough, love. What’s up?”
“Just my monthlies have started. At least I am not going to blow up with a baby from those Elves.” She winced at another cramp, and a tear forced its way out as she thought of the despair she used to feel every time her bleeding started, meaning no Royal baby. Now it should be delight, no rapist’s bastard. Her thoughts were all over the place.
Naomi switched back to Elvish. “There you go, lad. When did a fairy queen have a monthly bleed, hey?”
Oengus looked blank. “Bleed? Monthly? She is unclean? She must stay here and we will camp on the other side of the stream.”
Naomi smacked him over the top of the head. “Unclean? I’ll give you unclean, you filthy bastard. Now come here, you’re to fuck her, right now by the stream.” She showed her pleasure at being released to use the f-word by Susan’s prior use.
Both Oengus and Susan looked at her in horror.
“Come on the both of you, get your clothes off and get down by those soft grasses, just there. You don’t want a blanket, mind, as you are going to make a bit of a mess.”
“But, she’s unclean…”
“I’m having my monthly, I can’t do that now…”
“Oh, you poor lamb, you don’t know? And you with your unclean nonsense can shut right up. There’s two of us girls, and we both bleed, and if you come out with any more of it, well, you can forget having sex for the rest of the month. We’ll trade you in for a dog.” She started to help Susan take her clothes off. “When the pain is bad, best thing for you is sex. Providing he takes his time. You want it long and strong, and come good and hard. Gets rid of the cramps, see. Try it, you’ll see I’m right.”
Susan cramped again, and decided she was willing to try anything that helped. She stripped, washed herself in the brook and laid herself down with some trepidation. Naomi had managed to get Oengus’ clothes off and led him to her.
“I’m taking away her pain? It is not forbidden? This is a good thing? It will help her? She really is Susan?”
“Yes, yes, yes to all of it. Go on, make her better, I’ll set up camp and make supper.”
*
Naomi smiled as the two came up from the stream, Oengus helping Susan with solicitude, and Susan with genuine happiness in her smile. She had peeled the skin off the rabbits, jointed them and placed them in a pot which she cooked on heated flat stones by the fire along with the flatbreads and some strawberries she collected on the way.
“There’s some mint down by the stream, so I made tea from it. That will help the cramps as well, dear, but not as much as Oengus.”
They made slow progress for the next two days before Susan’s flow dropped to a trace and the cramps subsided. She became bouncy and her emotions stabilised, while Oengus spent more time in contemplation. The palfrey became difficult in the afternoon, headstrong and obstinate. Susan brought her up to the wagon, berating the horse as she did so, and tied her to the back, while she climbed on the front.
“I didn’t realise you had a name for her,” said Naomi with interest. “What was that you were calling her?”
“Apart from bloody bitch, you mean? Oh, sometimes I call her Rin, not that she knows.”
“Why Rin? Odd name.”
“After a friend of mine, because she likes to be ridden. What do you call the carthorse?”
“Him? He hasn’t got a name, just ‘hey you’.” Naomi spoke thoughtfully. She knew there was a joke of some sort in Susan’s words but couldn’t work it out. “What’s wrong with your mare?”
“I’ve no idea, she’s being difficult. Normally she is very good, does what she is told, but the last few days she has a mind of her own and just seems to want to upset me.”
Oengus smiled. “She comes into season. She itches, and it is not you she wants on her back. Tomorrow, maybe we cannot move as she will be in full flower and this old horse will be after her and won’t want to pull the wagon.”
Indeed, the carthorse pulled the wagon in a far more active manner than previously, tossing his head and scenting the wind. Oengus needed to pay constant attention to stop him turning.
“More difficult with the mare behind,” he said.
They camped for the night in forest, with scant grazing and the mare stayed close, annoying Susan by following her and nudging her at any opportunity. Meanwhile, the carthorse followed the mare, sniffing under her tail and being kicked for his presumption. A prodigious appendage appeared underneath him and the sight of it alarmed Susan.
“Oh you poor thing, no wonder you don’t want him to put that in you. Oengus, we must do something to stop him, he will hurt her.”
He glanced at the horse, before returning to straightening an arrow. “She won’t have a problem with him.”
Susan did not feel reassured, and tried to tempt the horse with an apple. Neither of them wanted it.
“It’s not the mating you should worry about,” said Naomi with a grim look. “It’s the birthing. That carthorse was once a warhorse, a charger, with a heavy knight on his back. He’s a big fellow, and if his foal is big, it might hurt your mare.”
Susan took a few long minutes to work out the essential details and became concerned. She elected to picket both horses, keeping them well apart.
After an hour of the horses whinnying to each other, she acquiesced to her companions’ complaints and picked the horses close enough that their heads could touch. The huffing and puffing continued through the night and in the morning the carthorse had pulled up his pin and the two horses grazed the thin grass side by side.
Susan inspected her critically, and Rin happily lifted her tail to display her anatomy with pride. Susan palpitated the swelling and Rin seeped, causing Susan to squeal for help.
“It is normal,” said Oengus with a cursory glance.
Nevertheless, Susan’s concern meant she brought water and cloth to wash Rin, but the carthorse arrived first to lick her clean, much to Susan’s annoyance.
This brought the appendage b
ack into play and, in front of Susan, the lumbering carthorse reared up and sank into the willing mare, snorting and bracing herself against his weight. Susan drew in a sharp breath, biting her tongue, and conceded defeat, retreating from the nuptials and making it plain to Oengus that she was not interested in a parallel bout despite the delay in departure.
A frisky Rin encouraged Susan to saddle up and they managed more than ten leagues that day, before the horses insisted on stopping for another tryst. Susan refused to explain to Naomi why she christened the carthorse Dicky, as she helped set up the camp for the night.
Naomi shrugged and changed the subject. “Oengus, I am all healed up now, so tonight you can go a bit further.” Susan wore a blank expression, as she tried to work out what Naomi meant, but Oengus understood straight away as he piled the blankets on the cut grass.
“Why wait, the bed is ready.” He pounced on her, pulling her onto the bed and removing her dress while she giggled. Susan gasped, began to protest before snapping her mouth shut and taking a basket to go foraging, her head full of images she did not want, showing Oengus’ palpable pleasure in Naomi’s ample bosom.
She returned with little but thistles, to find the pair asleep and she listened to their breathing while she peeled the thistle stems. A change alerted her to their wakening, but instead of coming to help her, Oengus returned to Naomi’s body. Susan’s knuckles whitened on her knife handle, and she wondered what happened to ‘I love you, mistress.’ She kept her eyes on the task of preparing supper, until Oengus gasped and after that she could not take her eyes off them. She remembered Naomi’s patient words, her instruction while Susan lay underneath. Now she could see Naomi enacting her own instructions and it was far beyond the restrictions of Susan’s natural shyness, as she utilised her body in ways Susan just had not grasped. And Oengus was loving it.
Her own inadequacy, brought home to her by watching Irina and the king but submerged by apparent Elvish desire for her, resurfaced larger than before, to grow through the night as she listened to the horses on one side and the couple on the other. Naomi did bring her into the embraces on several occasions, and a couple of times Oengus suckled at her breast, but her awkward stiffness meant they concentrated on each other, unaware of Susan’s increasing misery.
She was up early, saddling Rin and eating dry bread from the stores as she went ahead to scout the trail, leaving them to pack up camp and follow behind. Her thoughts a mess, she couldn’t concentrate on any aspects, but Caomh’s face and body kept reappearing. One moment she would daydream of his caresses, the next she would see the king taking Irina in the garden. She remembered the glorious feeling of Oengus groaning as he climaxed, before seeing the rapture on his face as Naomi gyrated beneath him.
Rage suffused her, as she pulled out her staff and practised using it from the saddle, every passing branch with Oengus’ face, till her hands were red and sore. The anger bled from her at the sight of two pigeons on branch. She stopped to watch them, the hen trying to feed on shoots while the male puffed up and pouted, getting in the way and following close behind when she flapped to the next branch. Memories of her lovers flooded up and she began to anticipate the night with Oengus, her body flushing with desire.
He wouldn’t want her, though, would he? Naomi was ready for him now, and she couldn’t take the rejection she knew would come. She rode back to the trail, mind made up with the need to tell him to make a choice; no she would finish it, tell him he could never have her again. But maybe once more, maybe he would call her Aine as he took her with a look of wonder in his eyes. He would want her tonight, she knew and she rose in the stirrups to see the carthorse coming up a slope, the wagon coming into view. Revealing Naomi sitting on Oengus’ lap, writhing, while the carthorse carried on phlegmatically.
Face flaming with another rejection, Susan swung Rin round and cantered down the trail, squeezing hard with her thighs to overcome the horse’s objections and stop the tears falling from her eyes.
Rounding a corner, Rin reared and whinnied as a man, an Elf, appeared from a bush to block the path. White clay daubed his face, overlaid with crimson and he brandished a fearsome spear while waving a stick with a mass of fur strips at one end. Susan’s horsemanship had improved during the last fortnight, but was insufficient to stay on board and she flew through the air to land on her bottom in the trail. Rin bolted and the figure loomed over her, his stick whipping across her face and buffeting her from both sides.
“Stop it!” She flared at the fearsome figure in Elvish, and he fell back, painted mouth open in astonishment. “You made my horse scared and now my bottom hurts, you, you, you horrid little man. Is this some sort of joke? Well it isn’t funny and you look silly. Now help me up.” She held out a hand and the man took it without thinking, pulling her to her feet. She dusted herself off, twisting her body and trying to see the state of dirt on her bottom, before turning to the man, standing crestfallen in front of her.
She could not work out his age, he felt ancient but the lines in his face were few, and his posture erect and strong, if a little emaciated and at present drooping. His hair hung long and black down his back to his waist, knotted in a complex pattern with various items woven into the design. Under the paint she could make out the fine lines of a handsome man with no idea what to do. Her burst of anger passed, taking with it her insecurities and melancholy and her normal sunny nature resurfaced.
“I’m sorry,” she said suppressing a giggle. “Was I supposed to be scared? Unfortunately, I have already met some really nasty people and there isn’t much scaredness left inside me.”
“My apologies,” said the man with consummate dignity. “I heard of your approach and purpose and wished to know what sort of person wanted my teaching. I am Maelbelenus. I am sorry to hear you met some unpleasant people; there are some nasty men ranging the Harrhein border. We do ask on occasion that your king clears the border.”
“These were Elves, and you could find a more appropriate way of testing your acolytes. I am not sure I still wish to study with you.” Susan regarded Maelbelenus with care, wondering that this was the man she had come so far to find. And dressed up as some sort of witch doctor? Was this really what she wanted? Where was the regal teacher, whose fame spread as far as Praesidium?
“Elves? Renegades? Here in the south? Disgraceful, this is what comes of lax spiritual leadership. I shall have words. Now come, we shall talk as we walk to my house, it is not far, barely an hour. What do you know of the influence of the moon on emotions, specifically those of women?”
Battle
The Spakka formed up in a long line, several men deep, great round shields overlapping in the front, a process which took a couple of hours while the Harrheinians marched closer. Spakka pipers strode in front of the line, competing with each other and dragging the men into song. Brawny young Spakka boys, dressed in just shorts, barefoot, dragged wooden barriers in front of the lines, with wicked spiked tree trunks pointing forward to welcome the Heavy Horse. Asmara searched for diggings, seeing no sign of death traps for horse beyond the barriers. She ran her estimate of the Spakka over again, amazed at their ability to bring so many over the ocean and keep them resupplied. There must be well over five thousand men here, perhaps as many as seven. All front line warriors, it seemed, and she recounted again, counting a section of the wall accurately, then multiplying that by the number of sections in the wall.
Her tongue protruded as she went through the mental calculations before eyeing Sergeant Russell. “Six and half thousand warriors, Andy?”
“Near enough, Princess.” They kept their voices to a whisper, despite the distance, in case of pickets.
Asmara worried. She knew the Harrhein army to be larger, ten thousand men, but few were hardened soldiers. Yes, the Northern Lords wore their scars with pride and amounted to a solid core of three thousand, and the Galician and Harrhein cavalry, most of whom would fight on foot, practised for warfare
on a daily basis, hacking at each other in the lists with blunted swords. They made up another two thousand, but half were in the reserve, and the remaining five thousand were levees, farmers paying their lords through armed service. Few possessed experience, let alone armour, weapons or skill, but held sharpened poles and improvised farm implements. They were of no more use in fighting Spakka than to tire their warriors’ axe-wielding arms.
The Harrhein columns marched forward, drawing up in lines opposite the Spakka wall, the shouts of sergeants preparing the men, while Spakka champions strode out to challenge. Some of them managed broken Harrheinian, liberal lacings of insults making their intentions plain. While the Harrheinians moved into position, the invitations received no response at all, but once in position and waiting, boredom set in, and it wasn’t long before the first champion strode from the ranks, a Galician knight unknown to the watchers on the cliff.
The niceties of the combat could not be seen from the cliff, till the climax when the knight threw his shattered shield in the axeman’s face before running him through with a sword, seconds before the axe removed his head.
“That’s a draw,” said Jez.
Asmara kept quiet, surprised that the marshal permitted the challenges. They made the warfare all too similar to the old ways, trumpeting glory rather than winning, and though she appreciated the entertainment while the lines sorted themselves out, and thrilled at Spakka blood spilt on the ground, rather too many Harrhein heads went spinning into the air for comfort.
Jez turned to her Master-at-Arms.
“See here, Andy, you’ve fought these bastards, face to face?”
Sergeant Russell grunted and rubbed his thigh, where an Uitlander spear penetrated a few years earlier “Couple of times. Hard not to on the frontier.”
“How do they react to horses?”
“Threaten the rider, usual style, then take the horses legs from under before chopping up the rider as he lands.”
